Reluctant Enchantress

  RELUCTANT

  ENCHANTRESS

  Lucy Keane

  “They’re never going to believe you’re just my secretary!” Amy had badly needed the secretarial job at Prior Harding Investments. She had to support herself and Charlie somehow while she tried to get her catering business off the ground. So, as far as the demandingly dynamic Julius Prior was concerned, Amy had resolved to appear the dedicated, efficient paragon that Julius was looking for in a secretary—one with no outside distractions! But things weren’t quite working out as Amy had planned.

  CHAPTER ONE

  ‘Well, there’s Dennis,’ said the plump and friendly Jacquie, clearly delighted to be the one to impart all the vital gossip. ‘But of course he interviewed you, so you’ve got some idea of him already. Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat with that coffee? The office is paying, you know!’ Her tone indicated that there would be a blue moon that night.

  Amy noted with some amusement the iced bun that was overlapping the edges of her companion’s small china plate—Jacquie was obviously celebrating in advance that evening’s astronomical rarity!

  Then she glanced round the tea rooms with interest—flowery wallpaper, old-fashioned Windsor chairs, and an appetising display of fresh baking along the bread counter by the door. It was an unexpected and pleasant alternative to being asked to wait in that cramped hall of Prior Harding Investments with the decorators about to splatter paint on her head any minute, or wandering the streets for an hour in the rain. If she got the job, she might contrive a few little errands that would take her past the Wistaria Tea Rooms, even though she wouldn’t be able to afford lunch-breaks there.

  She took a deep breath, trying to steady the continual fluttering feeling inside that told her her future might depend on the very minutes she was living through right now: Jacquie might have been detailed to report back to her bosses on their potential new secretary. Of course Dennis could have made up his mind against her already, but she still had one more interview to go. She smiled at her companion, and opened her third brown sugar packet, pouring the contents into her coffee. Too nervous to eat, she refused the offer of a cake, and then asked, ‘How come they’ve let you take me out like this?’

  Jacquie watched fascinated as Prior Harding’s prospective employee stirred what must now be a syrupy mess at the bottom of her cup. Amy Thompson was as thin as the proverbial rake. ‘Do you always drink it like that? If you don’t mind my saying so, you’ve got the kind of figure that looks as though it’s fed on nothing but Perrier and dry biscuits!’

  Despite the hint of envy in the other woman’s tone, Amy didn’t feel flattered. She was conscious of the fact that she’d lost far too much weight recently; surely only someone of Jacquie’s over-generous proportions could see hers as a desirable figure. ‘I just happen to be one of those people who uses up a lot of nervous energy, that’s all. Sweet drinks keep me going.’

  ‘Then maybe you should eat more?’ her companion offered, tentatively.

  Amy flicked a long dark red strand of hair over one shoulder and took a trial sip. ‘I eat like a horse these days but it doesn’t seem to make much difference,’ she said offhandedly. ‘But go on telling me about the job— what’s Mr. Harding like to work for? He seems very nice.’

  ‘Oh, he’s a sweetie really. He gets in a flap from time to time and needs cups of tea to calm him down, but he isn’t too demanding when it comes to working late, even when there’s a mega-crisis.’ Jacquie took a sip of her own coffee. ‘Not that Prior’s wouldn’t give anyone a nervous breakdown—oops!’ She put a short-fingered capable hand in front of her mouth. ‘I’m not supposed to say things like that in front of someone we’re interviewing. But you’ll find out for yourself soon enough and you might as well know what you’re coming to.’

  ‘Then you think I could be offered the job?’ Amy asked with a sideways glance out of slanting blue eyes, trying to keep herself from hoping too desperately. ‘Has he interviewed a lot of secretaries?’

  There was a significant pause, and then her informant said in discreet tones, ‘I’m sure I’m not to tell you this either, but the last secretary just walked out last week— not,’ she added hastily, ‘that it had anything to do with the company! She had some horrendous family problems, and Prior’s isn’t the place to work if you need time off to sort out difficulties at home.’

  That was very bad news—but Amy reminded herself that she couldn’t afford to comment in a way that might sound negative and get passed on. She had to get the job, she just had to! It was the only one that had been advertised for weeks with a salary she could actually live on. Jacquie, unaware of the effect she was having on her companion, went on blithely, ‘We’re always pretty busy, and all hell’s been let loose since the Spanish property deal. But don’t worry about the job. I’m sure you’ll get it. We’ve had very few applicants. Wychford isn’t exactly a thriving metropolis when it comes to attracting first-class secretaries and we need someone permanent as soon as possible.’

  First-class secretaries—and I’m not even second class! Amy thought gloomily, and asked, ‘Why is Mr. Harding letting you come out to drink coffee with me if you’re all so busy?’

  ‘Dennis,’ Jacquie corrected. ‘We call the bosses by their first names—it’s part of the office fiction that we’re all equal. He’s afraid you might slip off the hook before Julius sees you. None of the other applicants could have coped and he’s desperate for someone—most of them were straight out of secretarial courses with no experience at all. Actually, Dennis would have been prepared to put up with that for a while, but Julius wouldn’t.’

  Who exactly was this Julius character? All three people she had met so far had alluded to him at some point in their conversation, but since no one had thought to explain him they must assume his position in the company was obvious.

  ‘I don’t quite understand why I have to see this Julius at all,’ she began. ‘After all, the job advertisement did say it was Mr. Harding—Dennis—who wanted a secretary, and he is a director, isn’t he?’

  Jacquie’s eyes opened wide. ‘My dear girl, we don’t even take on the humblest office cleaner until Julius approves them! I expect he thinks they’ll pick the locks on the filing cabinets unless he intimidates them first.’

  ‘Is he intimidating?’ Another bad prospect! She’d thought she might be able to manage Dennis without having to reveal the fact that she would be working every spare minute at building up her own business. But Julius whoever-he-was didn’t sound like a good thing at all. The mental picture she got was of a man in his midforties, like Dennis, only more aggressive and bad-tempered.

  ‘Yes and no,’ Jacquie was saying. ‘I was terrified of him at first—all that dynamic energy simmering away. He takes work very seriously, and when you cross him— zap! You’re seeing stars for days—the kind that swim before your eyes in a sickening haze, not the romantic ones he probably shows his fiancée—’

  His fiancée? ‘How old is he?’ Maybe she’d got the image wrong.

  Jacquie shrugged. ‘About thirty-three, thirty-four— tall, dark and gorgeous! Zoe cried for days when he got engaged, but she had to admit in the end that Fiona is very eligible.’

  Not what she’d been expecting, but the type was all too predictable! ‘And I suppose he thinks he’s God’s gift to women?’

  ‘Well, he is!’ Jacquie said earnestly, her round eyes goggling a little. ‘Although he doesn’t seem to notice women much—as women, if you know what I mean. Not the ones who work for him, anyway. He’s got a huge house in Wiltshire as well as a cottage in one of the villages round here. I know the Prior Harding offices don’t look like very much, but he and Dennis are absolutely coining it! They keep costs down by stayin
g out of London, and Julius seems to have a sixth sense when it comes to the investments. I sometimes wonder if he won’t be arrested for insider dealing one of these days.’

  So Julius was the ‘Prior’ part of the company. ‘You mean he’s crooked?’

  ‘Heavens no! I was only joking.’ Jacquie sounded horrified.

  ‘So I’ve only got to see him because the cleaners do?’

  ‘Not exactly. In your case—’

  But she wasn’t destined to find out her case at that precise moment because Zoe, the other secretary she had met earlier and recognised instantly because of her startling ginger hair, burst into the tea rooms and dived towards their table.

  ‘He’s back,’ she announced breathlessly, ‘and he wants you at the office this minute! He’s got to go out again before half-past four.’

  ‘I’ll pay the bill,’ Jacquie said, with bustling efficiency. She was already on her feet, one arm through the sleeve of her raincoat while the other groped automatically for her purse. ‘You get back there, Zo, and take Amy with you. I’ll catch you up.’

  Amy, taken aback by the air of panic that had suddenly been injected into the quiet tea shop, found her nervous qualm unexpectedly subsiding into a feeling of mild disgust—really, the way they were behaving, you’d think it was a royal audience! Just who did Julius Prior imagine he was? Clutching her own raincoat, she looked around with irritation for her umbrella.

  ‘Come on!’ Zoe was halfway out of the door.

  Yes, sir, no, sir, three bags full, sir! She didn’t even have time to get her coat on or put the umbrella up as she panted along the pavement behind the flying Zoe. ‘Do I salute when I meet him?’

  ‘What?’ Zoe didn’t wait to catch her reply, and, well ahead of her, disappeared through the attractive pillars flanking the front door of the Georgian house which had been converted into the offices of Prior Harding Investments.

  Thoroughly annoyed, Amy instantly slowed to a walk. Her independent spirit resisted anything that resembled petty dictatorship. It seemed ridiculous to be sprinting along the quiet little streets like that all because some latter-day Hitler couldn’t wait two minutes—after he’d kept her hanging about for the best part of an hour! And it wasn’t as though she didn’t have anything better to do with her time.

  She abandoned the idea of struggling into her raincoat—there wasn’t much point now—but she put her umbrella up. There was still no sign of Jacquie.

  Then, as she reached the front steps, the slim heel of the only suitable pair of shoes she possessed stuck between the uneven flagstones, and with an unexpected wrench she found herself hopping forwards at a surprising speed, while the shoe remained wedged in the pavement. She hopped back again to pick it up, and the heel came off in her hand…

  With heroic self-control she resisted two overwhelming impulses at once—to shout the worst swear word she could think of at the top of her voice, and to hurl the offending shoe at the nearest litter-bin. With such a vital interview ahead of her, this had better not be an omen…

  Jacquie panted up to her elbow.

  ‘Oh, bad luck—come upstairs and I’ll see if I can find something to stick it with—I’m sure there’s some Superglue in the desk.’

  Amy tried to quell her rising exasperation with life— destiny—the entire universe, to ask calmly, ‘But what about my interview with the Führer?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Mr Prior—Julius—whatever you call him.’

  But Jacquie was already shepherding her through the step-ladders and paint cans in the hall, and up the flight of stairs that led to the first-floor offices. In order to negotiate them with any degree of safety she had to take the other shoe off, and that was awkward because there was a huge crescent of red nail varnish round the hole in the toe of her tights. Usually careless of her appearance, she’d made a special effort to look smart and efficient for this interview—but what was the point, she asked herself in exasperation, when fate intended all along to defeat you?

  And fate was still at it, if what happened next was anything to go by. As she reached the open reception area at the top of the stairs, Jacquie behind her, a door flew open and a dark-haired man strode through it.

  ‘Zoe! Where’s that bloody Thompson woman? I thought I told you to go and fetch her! I’ve got exactly ten minutes—I’m not taking her on without—’

  And then he came to an abrupt halt.

  Amy in her turn faltered to a standstill.

  It just had to be…

  He was quite tall, but not unusually so; quite good-looking, but again not startlingly. But there definitely was something about him that could stop you dead in your tracks… With undisguised interest she examined the rather long face, with its straight nose and cleft chin and firmly drawn mouth, while he seemed to be taking in, very slowly, everything from her bedraggled hair downwards—damp jacket, rather short skirt, rather long mud-splashed legs, and last but definitely not least—the scarlet-ringed hole in one stocking.

  Then his eyes met hers. He had the most unusual eyes—long fine dark lashes shadowed them, and they were a clear, lucent grey, grey like the sea, the irises ringed with darker colour. Eyes that were unexpectedly thoughtful while they gave nothing away.

  Then she was aware that the voice that had been shouting only seconds before was saying quite pleasantly, ‘Have you hurt your foot?’

  But the merest sea-change in those disquieting eyes just before he spoke warned her to be wary: in that moment he seemed to have come to some decision about her. She was very much afraid it wasn’t in her favour. If she wanted this job she really was going to have to fight for it—and letting herself be put at a disadvantage by an unfortunate moment of introduction wasn’t the way to go about it. She guessed that if Julius Prior could be impressed by anyone it wasn’t going to be an inept weed who let life’s little accidents get the better of her!

  ‘Yes!’ she said, with the lightest edge of defiance. ‘Tropical Sunset’ by no stretch of the imagination could be described as blood-colour.

  His eyes flicked over her again briefly. ‘And do you usually carry your raincoat about like that on wet days?’ There was just a hint of amused criticism now.

  ‘I didn’t have time to put it on.’ He was taller than her, and that mildness in his tone was deceptive: she could sense a sort of leashed energy in him that could be very intimidating if she let it. And then she remembered she wasn’t the only one in a potentially embarrassing situation and that little demon of defiance pushed her a step further.

  She had a particular curving smile, a smile she’d often been told was fascinatingly enigmatic and witch-like. She tried it now on Julius Prior as she announced in her sweetest, quietest voice, ‘I’m that bloody Thompson woman.’

  There was an audible gasp from Jacquie behind her, but she couldn’t read the slight change in expression on the face of the dark-haired man. Then he crossed the passage at a stride and held out his hand. ‘I’m Julius Prior—’ But she’d known that from the moment she saw him.

  In the hand she needed to shake his, she found herself clutching her shoes, and she passed them—in three pieces—to Jacquie. Then, because the shoes had been muddy and she had dirt on her fingers, she automatically wiped them on her skirt as though it had been her usual apron, before she offered her hand. It didn’t occur to her that she had done anything odd until she saw the look—fully legible this time—on Julius’s face as the dark eyebrows shot up in amazement.

  The ensuing silence became electric, and then he said, ‘You’d better come into my office, Am—er—Miss Thompson. Jacquie—take Miss Thompson’s shoes down to that heel bar in the High Street, would you? Tell them it’s urgent and then come straight back here. I’ll drop her off to collect them when I leave for Oxford. Miss Thompson?’

  She followed him, closing the office door behind her. He hadn’t even waited politely like Dennis for her to go in first. Perhaps she’d gone a bit too far with that last remark. But he hadn’t asked her
to leave. Yet.

  She could feel the adrenalin pumping through her blood, and took a deep careful breath to slow a nervously rapid heartbeat. Now. This was what it was all about. The next few minutes would decide what sort of a future she and Charlie were going to get.

  Julius Prior picked up a sheet of typed paper from the desk, a handwritten letter stapled to the top of it. She recognised it instantly as her own C.V. and letter of application. Then he turned to face her, and propped himself against the desk, arms folded, long legs stretched out in front of him, one ankle casually crossed over the other. He had lean thighs and slim hips, and the charcoal-grey business suit he was wearing looked as though it had been measured to fit by a very expensive tailor.

  The lucid grey eyes again regarded her thoughtfully. Refusing to let him daunt her, she returned the stare and wondered if he’d even ask her to sit down. Involuntarily, she curled her toes into the heavy-duty carpet.

  ‘Red hair and blue eyes,’ he said at last. ‘And what would an Irish witch with limited relevant experience— and a curious choice of referees—be doing applying to work in an office like this?’

  Her heart sank. Not a very auspicious opening! He obviously thought her a long way short of the requirements.

  ‘I applied for the post because I was sure I could handle it.’ She was amazed at how cool she managed to sound. She knew what that remark about references was alluding to, but couldn’t bring herself to explain it. Not just yet. ‘I know it doesn’t look as though I’ve had a very consistent career as a secretary, but it does mean I’ve got varied experience,’ she persuaded.

  ‘Y-e-s.’ The slow, thoughtful drawl wasn’t exactly encouraging, and that sea colour of his eyes was suspiciously steely now. ‘We can’t afford to “nanny” anyone in this job, Miss Thompson. You sink or swim from day one. There’s another thing—we won’t even consider anyone who isn’t prepared to commit herself fully, which means if you’re asked to work late you work late, and if you’re asked to come in early you come in early. That’s why we pay such high salaries. The last secretary who had the post found she couldn’t give the job that sort of commitment. We can’t take on anyone who has half her mind on home problems. Do you have home problems, Miss Thompson?’