Caught on Camera with the CEO (3 page)

 

‘Kelly, I need you.' Alex called his PA into his office. ‘The temp who was working on the Huntsman project last week—' He broke off. His super-efficient PA had a touch more colour to her cheeks than usual. But her brows lifted as if she were vaguely mystified.

As if.

‘Temp?'

‘Yes. Short, brunette bob.' Alex winced, hating to have to reveal that he didn't know her name. He watched Kelly's lips purse and sighed, frustrated. ‘You've seen the clip, haven't you?' Now he felt his cheeks heating.

Kelly dropped the ‘no idea' look and nodded. ‘Yes. She no longer works here.'

‘How come she's no longer working here? That project is months off completion.' Alex found he couldn't meet Kelly's eyes. Hell, what a mess. He'd never compromised himself at work like this. Socially for sure—he liked to play. But not at work. Kelly had worked for this company for more years than he'd been alive. She'd worked with Samuel, and his father before him. A Carlisle loyalist. There was nothing in the
business that she didn't know. Alex remembered her giving him paper as a kid to entertain him while he waited for Samuel and him making darts to shoot at people walking past. The severe look she was giving him now wasn't so different from the one she'd given him then.

‘I know,' Kelly said quietly. ‘But there's a new temp now.'

Alex looked at her then, hearing the soberness in her voice. He didn't like the censure in her eyes, either. ‘I think you'd better send Jo to see me.'

Kelly disappeared and Jo, the head of HR, was knocking at his door in less than a minute. Alex walked over to meet her. ‘The temp that we had working on the Huntsman project last week—where is she?'

Jo looked distinctly uncomfortable. ‘The temp?'

‘Yes,' he growled. ‘You know the one I mean.'

‘Yes.' Of course she did. ‘Her services were no longer required.'

‘But there's a new temp out there now.' He'd walked through the floor as soon as he'd got in, run the gauntlet of knowing looks and smiles only to be completely disappointed when it had been some blonde at the desk and not the little brunette who'd been haunting him for days. ‘So why did you get rid of the other one? On whose authority? For what reason?' He rapped out the questions, the nasty feeling in his gut growing.

Jo looked even more uncomfortable. ‘It was the recruitment agency. They phoned and said they'd made a mistake with her file. They hadn't been able to verify her school qualifications so they pulled her.'

Alex stared at her, anger churning. ‘So she's no longer working for the agency?'

‘No. I don't believe she is.'

It was his turn to take a deep breath—he had to force his jaw apart to do it. ‘They couldn't verify her school qualifications?' Alex shook his head. ‘But we had security clearance for her? And proof of her banking exams?'

‘Yes.'

So the records meant diddly, then. If she had her banking qualifications, then they didn't need to verify any other records—she couldn't have got the bank ones if she hadn't had the school ones. It was a trumped up excuse to get rid of her.

‘So it wouldn't have had anything to do with this?' He strode to his desk and spun his computer screen round so the image he'd paused it on was viewable from her side of the room.

His head of HR went beet red.

Alex leaned back on his desk and folded his arms, hiding the fists. ‘Don't tell me you haven't seen it. Everyone in the office has seen it. Haven't they?'

Jo nodded.

‘And now you're telling me she's been removed for the most flimsy of reasons.'

‘We're covered, Alex. It was the agency who removed her. Her dismissal had nothing to do with this…incident.'

Alex stared at her, unable to believe his ears. Like hell it didn't. She'd done nothing wrong. She shouldn't have lost her job. His fists bunched tighter.

‘Does she have another job?' He could only hope she had a better one.

‘I don't know.'

‘Then you better phone the agency and find out,' he growled—he was not going to be able to rest until he knew. The job market was horrendous at the moment. That meant the temp market was even more vicious.

‘Excuse me, Alex.' Kelly came back in, shutting the door
fast behind her and stepping forward. ‘I have someone outside insisting on seeing you.'

‘Who is it?' Alex asked crossly. ‘I don't want interruptions now, Kelly.'

‘I know you don't. But this one is different. It's her.'

‘Who?'

‘That temp.'

Alex froze. ‘She's here?'

Kelly nodded.

‘Now?' The ripple that ran through his body was pure testosterone. ‘You. Out,' he barked at Jo.

She was out of there faster than a condemned prisoner getting a last-minute reprieve. But Alex was the one feeling the edge of desperation. He turned to the woman who knew more about what went on in the building than anyone. ‘Kelly, please, what's her name?'

Kelly looked up at him through her half-glasses, her face as impassive and composed as always. When she finally answered, it was with marked deliberation. ‘You really ought to know that already.' Then she left.

Alex stared at the door and wondered how on earth he was going to get away with it.

 

Dani perched on the edge of the chair—the one nearest to the exit. She shouldn't have come. What was she doing back here? Sweating for one thing and she was all shaky inside, as if it wouldn't take much for tears to sting. She couldn't let that happen—getting all emo was one sure way to come off the loser. She blinked and went rigid as the hideous HR dragon appeared from his office. She glanced at Dani but made no acknowledgement as she swept past. That was it—Dani was leaving. What had possessed her to attempt this? Oh, yeah, desperation.

Now the PA was standing in front of her. ‘Mr Carlisle will see you now.'

Mr Carlisle. She swallowed, tried to quell the fluttering inside, told herself she had no need for nerves. But the moment before the door opened she had a second, a sliver of a second, when she thought she'd really rather die.

She pushed through, went in and it happened as it had all the last week. The large hand gripped her heart and squeezed, stopping the beat for two seconds too long, while lower in her belly someone switched on the heater.

He was in a suit. It was immaculate. He wasn't smiling.

But he was still brain-zappingly gorgeous and she was as bad as the thousand other women who fell at his feet—breathless, bedazzled. She tried to clear her mind of the clutter, to quell the hormones shrieking at her. Think Zen. Think power.

‘Thanks, Kelly.'

Dani heard the door click. So it was shut. So they were alone.

He wasn't behind his desk; instead he stood on her side of it, in the middle of the room. ‘My name is—'

‘I know who you are.'

Their eyes met. His face was expressionless. But she knew he was remembering the moment after the last time she'd said that, just as she was. That time the spark in his eye had surprised her. The oh-so-relaxed boss, the charming playboy, had looked bitter for a half-second. She'd spent all that night wondering why—in between reliving the heat.

‘Please sit down.' Quiet, firm and with that underlying note of authority.

Her legs moved towards the chairs without her instruction—just following his order. She seemed to have swallowed her tongue. Every sentence, the whole spiel she'd rehearsed as she'd steamed her way over here, had fled from
her head. Mute, mindless, she was like some star-struck fan meeting her pin-up hottie in the flesh for the first time.

And then she saw it.

Every word, every angry thought, all of it came ripping back. She inhaled, trying to hold back enough to be able to tackle him with controlled fury rather than blind rage. Even so, she spat the words. ‘Enjoying it?'

‘What?'

‘Your little home movie.' She pointed.

They were plastered across the screen. Her legs around his waist. Their tongues so entwined it was a wonder they'd ever managed to pull themselves free.

And he was watching it? Had spun the screen round so it was visible from right across the room?

As if the HR woman had just come to give him his warning—she'd come for a laugh, more like. Dani nearly choked on the rage that reddened her vision. Her face was so hot she was probably casting a glow into outer space. But that was nothing on the churning mass of fire in her belly. ‘Why are you watching it?'

He hadn't known she was coming to see him. She'd only finally made her mind up as she'd walked past the building—had been regretting it all the five minutes since. She couldn't believe the whole nightmare. ‘How did it happen?'

‘What?' He took the seat next to hers. ‘The kiss or the recording?' His mouth lifted at one end in a small smile.

She wasn't in the mood for seeing any kind of funny side—he wasn't going to defuse her with his attempt at good humour. ‘The recording.'

‘There are security cameras in all the lifts. Someone saw us, clipped the footage and put it up. As I think you know, it's been doing the rounds.'

‘Yes, the viral video
du jour
,' she said bitterly. ‘Was it a joke? Did you set it up for fun?'

‘Of course not.' He went rigid. ‘I'm the CEO of a large finance company. I think I have better things to do with my time than indulge in stupid pranks like this.'

He held her gaze a minute longer. Assessing. She withstood the scrutiny, tilting her chin that little higher. Refusing to be intimidated.

‘Where have you been these last few days?' Assertive, that was how she'd be.

‘Overseas.'

‘How convenient for you—out of the country while the temp gets the boot and then can't find another job in the whole city.'

‘What do you want me to do?'

‘Give me my job back.'

He shook his head. ‘Impossible.'

‘How so?'

‘You think you could sit there knowing they've all watched me kiss you like that?'

Kiss you.
The words seemed to whisper over her skin, teasing her into greater awareness. She shifted in her seat, resettling her limbs in an attempt to stay in charge of them—and the whole nightmare. ‘It was only a kiss, Mr Carlisle. It was nothing.' She shrugged.

His brows lifted for a second. ‘You're not going back out there.'

Damn it, she
needed
this job. ‘It was a moment. That's all it was. So some geek with nothing better to do made a mini movie with it. Not my fault.'

‘You are not working on that floor again.'

‘You're not understanding me. I need this job.'

‘And I'm saying it's not going to happen.'

‘Do you know what this is? Unfair dismissal. Sexual harassment.'

‘That was not sexual harassment.' He pointed at the screen. ‘You kissed me back. You wrapped your legs around me all by yourself.'

‘But because of that video, I lost my job and I need my job. Because of that video, I can't get another. The world of recruitment agencies is really small here in Auckland, do you know that? The agents all know each other, all swap from company to company. And they send each other
emails
. Would you believe that?' Dani inhaled. ‘That stupid kiss has cost me everything and I can't let it. How come you get to sit here in your fancy office and suffer none of the consequences while my life gets totalled?' She stood. ‘It's not happening. This is unfair and I'll prove it's unfair. I'm going to a lawyer—see if you can say
“impossible”
to a court!'

She whirled and marched. She had no idea where to find a lawyer, whether she really did have a case, and she certainly didn't have the money to pay for it but she was bloody well going to find it somehow.

She opened the door but it was slammed shut again—his big hand spread wide on the wood above her head and firmly holding it in place.

‘You don't shout at me and walk out without giving me a chance to respond.'

‘Watch me.' She pulled on the door handle with all her strength. It didn't move.

‘This is what happens. We talk. We negotiate. You're not leaving until you've let me think of an alternative.'

She turned to glare at him and discovered he was way too close. Right beside her, so all she could see was his body—
the jacket of his suit pulled wide by the way his arm was stretched out, revealing the breadth of his chest in the crisp white cotton beneath. His physicality was so potent, all she could feel was the warmth of him reaching out to her. The temptation to step closer was almost crippling—and totally wrong, wrong, wrong.

‘What kind of alternative?' The woolly feeling was seeping into her head. She lifted her chin to be able to look into his face and the brain lethargy only worsened. His eyes were looking very green.

‘Sit back down and I'll explain. If you want we can get my HR manager to sit in on the meeting.'

Reality returned with acute vividness. That cow? ‘That won't be necessary.'

His lips twitched. ‘My PA, then.'

Nope, not the boarding-school matron, either. ‘Look, you and I both know that if you lay a hand on me, I'll be screaming the place down.'

His face suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree and his smile went so wicked she wouldn't have been surprised if he had a doorway to a den of sin hidden behind his desk. Or maybe that was wishful thinking—because when he looked like that all she could think about was bad, bad behaviour. Then she mentally replayed what she'd said and suddenly felt a need to clarify. ‘Screaming in
horror
.'

‘Ri-i-ight.' He nodded as if she were a delusional diva he had to humour. ‘All outrage rather than ecstasy.'