The Boss's Mistletoe Maneuvers (9 page)

Nine

“J
eez. You’d think there were only three of us in the entire building,” Brenda quipped, looking back and forth from Kim to Monroe.

“Will you please excuse us for a minute, Brenda?” Monroe said.

Kim stood very still, afraid to say more of what was on her mind after doing so in his office, in front of one of his family members. In all honesty, she didn’t feel angry anymore, anyway; she felt drained. Dealing with Monroe had already taken its toll, and it seemed that toll kept on climbing.

“Kim?” Brenda awaited word on what to do.

“It’s okay, Bren. I’ve got this.”

Without further protest, Brenda left the elevator.

The door closed.

Monroe faced her from a distance of two feet; close enough for her to reach out and touch if she dared to confront the feelings she had tamped down in an effort to retain her dignity and sense of self. If she lost that sense of self, she feared what might happen. Would the past bring up trouble or be left behind in favor of something worse?

“I’m sorry,” Monroe said, out of the blue.

The apology surprised her. She hadn’t expected him to be so frank and straightforward, and had to distrust him, still.

More questions surfaced, like bubbles rising to the top of water, all of them concerning the man across from her.

If she were to start over, to leave the darkness in the distance, would she be setting herself up for a fall?

If she confessed to liking Monroe more than she should after knowing him for a mere two days—the same man that had teased her, kept things from her and then made her overheat with pleasure on more than one occasion—he might act upon that weakness and take further advantage.

If he realized how difficult it was for her to keep her hands off him, he might throw her against the wall and kiss everything from her lips to her berry-colored toes. Too much kissing, fondling and overheating sexually would mean that their relationship, however temporary, might fizzle equally as fast as it began. Flames this hot tended to burn out quickly. If that happened, her secret dread of ending up like her mother, holed up in a house and simmering in defeat, year after year, alone, would reappear as a possibility.

Tendencies for depression and mental instability sometimes ran in families, she had read. Though she had successfully avoided the symptoms, fear of them had more or less made her an emotional hermit.

The good thing—if there was a good thing to be found here—was that she knew how flawed she was.

“Sorry?” she echoed, wondering if Monroe was sorry for the pressure he was putting on her over her contract or the seductive heat he caused.

Did he regret last night?

“I know I have a problem,” she admitted, though the confession was difficult. “I’ve been trying to work it out, but it hurts me to do so. You’ll have to take my word that this isn’t some game I’m playing, and that I’ve protested the change in my contract in earnest.”

“Can we forget the blasted contract for a minute?” he said.

Kim glanced up at him from beneath her lashes.

“I’m not using you,” he went on. “I didn’t comprehend how serious this holiday thing was for you, and had to push for what the company needed. So I tested you, yes, but with good intentions, as I said last night.”

His expression confirmed his seriousness. The angles of his face were shadowed. He looked as if he hadn’t slept, as if he also had tossed and turned, going over the events that had transpired and regretting not being honest earlier.

Was the elevator to become a confessional booth for issues that could be addressed right then in the secluded space, with no one else present? Personal confessions?

“I need time to process problems in my past,” she said. “You’ve helped to make that clear, though I’ve known it all along. But because I might be vulnerable in my personal life doesn’t equate to weakness in my professional ethics. It’s just one thing that I need to deal with. Don’t you have something you’d like to leave behind, even though it might be tough?”

“Yes,” he said then added, “I’m sure everyone has something like that to face.”

“It’s easier when you have a family to back you up, though,” she said. “As well as enough money to buy a company where you can set your own rules.”

He took his time before responding. “There is a lot of risk involved with these investments. Not to mention stress,” he said. “This has been an extraordinary few days, and I’ll say one more time that I don’t want the company to lose you. Will you agree to stay after all is said and done? Will knowing you have your job help with whatever it is you’re going to do this week?”

Kim shook her head to hide the fact that the rest of her shook, as well. She felt something for this man, but wasn’t sure what. The sensations had come on too quickly, were too intense and all-consuming. Their relationship had started with anger and ended with heat.

Last night had been over the top, for as long as it lasted. Monroe’s body, his attention and his talents had caught her up, making her forget everything else that stood between them. But those moments of free fall had been ruined, and now she felt unsettled. The simplicity of an emotion like anger no longer fit or covered the situation. She wasn’t sure what did.

She lifted her gaze to the level of his chin. “I’m sorry I said those things in front of your mother. That was inexcusable.”

“I think my mother liked you. She called you feisty.”

Kim blinked slowly to block out the scene.

“We don’t have to talk now,” he said. “Do whatever you need to do to fix what you have going on. Just don’t count me as another problem to face, okay?”

“Are you offering to forget about the contract?”

“I can’t forget it in a potential vice president. I know you understand that, and that I have to do what’s best for the agency.”

“What is it you want, then? Friendship?”

“Yes, if that’s what it takes to keep you here. And no if I’m being completely truthful.”

Kim’s gaze rose higher. She didn’t want to be his friend, either, though that might not have been possible anyway, given the intensity of their connection. Despite trying to repress her feelings, she imagined what his hands would again feel like on her bare back, and how his lips might again sweep her away if she and Monroe dared to allow the sparks between them to dictate their future actions.

Kissing him last night had seemed right. In his arms nothing else had existed for a while, beyond two flames merging.

Now...

Now they were embarrassed and taken aback by their behavior, and he wanted to mend the situation.

“We are having the party,” he said. “It’s my family’s holiday celebration. I thought you should know that we’re going to utilize all the ideas you and I talked about in the bar, and more. You don’t have to be a part of planning, Kim, but I’d like you to attend.”

“As your disgruntled employee whose covert nickname is Scrooge?”

“As my guest.”

“I can’t commit to that right now.”

“Then you can give me your answer later. Maybe after a couple days off, you’ll accept.”

“Besides, I couldn’t possibly be welcome after your mother witnessed the drama in your office,” Kim said.

“On the contrary, my family thrives on drama. Trust me, you’d fit right in.”

Kim fisted her hands, ready to get away from him and the things still left unsaid. Confusion reigned. She wanted to take a step forward, yet she couldn’t allow it. She wanted to forget the past, but that past remained tied to her by a few tenacious threads. Relationship avoidance was one of them.

People got hurt if they fell hard and heaped love on one another, only to eventually have that love lost. Depression sometimes took over a lovesick soul. She had seen it happen firsthand.

She might like Monroe if she allowed herself to. She might have been able to love him someday, had the situation been different and she met him elsewhere.

“I’ll send you the details,” he said, bringing her out of her thoughts.

“You have a habit of refusing to take no for an answer,” she said softly.

“Only where it concerns me personally, and I feel as though I have a stake in the outcome.”

Of course, by personal
,
he was talking about his business, not about her. She had to keep that in mind. Monroe had to do what was best for the agency. His agency. Inviting her to the party was a final parting shot before sending her back to her cubicle.

He added, “If keeping you means hands-off, then that’s the way it will be. However, I’m not lying to you when I say that I’d like to kiss you right now. Hell, I’d like to do much more than that, and take up where we left off last night. I will also tell you this, Kim. I have never invited a woman to my parents’ home. You’d be the first. My guest. Night of fun. Truce in place.”

She didn’t have time to reply, and wasn’t sure how to, anyway. The door opened with a whooshing sound. A wave of cooler air swirled around them. Kim didn’t move until the doors started to close again and Monroe stepped in the way, a move that brought him closer to her and ensured that she had to touch him when she left the elevator.

Kim’s motionless body brimmed with longing for the man she should be wary of. He was the boss, and she fully comprehended his problem with her. If getting the most out of the agency meant having management that oversaw every aspect of it, she was not that candidate.

Because she understood that, she also realized that Chaz Monroe wasn’t the bad guy here, after all. She was disappointed about the job, but her anger with him had been misplaced.

The doors started to close, pushing at Monroe’s wide shoulders. As she brushed past him, her left arm touched his. The charge that careened through her was powerful enough to bring on a gasp. The urge to turn to him, get close to him, walk right into the circle of his arms, was so strong, she stiffened. And in her peripheral vision, she watched his hands mirror hers, fisting so that he wouldn’t catch her, change his mind and throw her against the gleaming metal.

And how she wanted him to do that, in spite of everything.

She paused close enough to him to feel his breath on her forehead. Close enough that all she had to do was look up, and her lips would be within reach of his. The sensations running through her were blatant reminders that she really did feel something for this man.

“It should be easy to agree.” Her voice caught. She sought his eyes, her pulse thudding hard. “When doing so might solve everything for a while.”

“Maybe you will come to the party as a start toward a mutually beneficial future,” he said. “I’m rooting for that.”

He didn’t grab her or kiss her, though Kim felt the pressure of that imaginary kiss as if he had overpowered her completely. She nearly backpedaled into the tiny space to make sure he did; almost asked him for a repeat of the mindless hunger that every cell in her body craved.

But Monroe moved out of the way, holding the door with one hand so that she could leave the elevator without further contact that would have spoken volumes about what they wanted to do to each other.

She had no alternative but to go.

Once she had passed him, Monroe stepped back inside and smiled at her earnestly, devastatingly, tiredly, as the elevator doors closed and the contraption took him from her, leaving her standing in the hallway.

Dozens of employees went about their business all around her, doing their jobs, unaware of the turmoil roiling through Kim that for one more brief moment made her need a wall for support.

Ten

K
im stood on the sidewalk, staring at the house. In the late-afternoon sun, the two-story brick structure had a forlorn appearance. Not shabby, exactly, but uncared for, unkempt.

Dark windows punctuated the 1940s brick cottage. On the front porch sat a collection of empty clay pots that had once contained pink geraniums to brighten the place. The small lawn was neatly trimmed, and a concrete walkway had been swept clear of debris. She’d seen to that by hiring a neighbor kid, who had taken the job seriously, though not once in the past six months had she thought to check.

“Welcome home, Kim,” she said to herself.

She picked up her small suitcase. Though the house in New Jersey was merely a half an hour’s train ride from her apartment, she planned to stay during her vacation.

It was several minutes before she took the first step up that walkway. Kim had to consciously remember that times here hadn’t always been dark, and that angst hadn’t always ruled the space between those walls. There had been good times. Fun times. Lighter moments. She had loved her mother, doted on her mother, until very near to the end when others took over the daily routine. Her mother had loved her back, to the best of her ability. It was just that her mother must have loved the husband that had long ago disappeared, more.

The windows, devoid of holiday trappings, were not welcoming. The blinds were drawn to keep out the world, and possibly to keep the old darkness contained.

Kim set her shoulders. This trip home was about coming to terms with those moments of darkness and banishing them for good. Harboring guilt about the past was unreasonable, unhealthy and getting in the way of living her life the way she wanted to.

It wasn’t Monroe’s fault that this confrontation had come up. She had meant to take care of this ages ago.

She wished now that she’d taken Brenda up on her offer of company. Having a friend along would have been preferable to facing some ghosts solo. But she was a woman now, no longer an impressionable child. She’d inform this house and its ghosts of her plans to let in the light and dust away cobwebs. Her presence might reinforce the good times.

If Monroe wanted a hassle-free associate, he’ll soon have one,
she thought as she blinked slowly and gritted her teeth. Then she headed up the walkway, determined to see this housewarming through, trying hard to keep her thoughts from turning to charming Chaz Monroe, and finding that task way too difficult.

* * *

Chaz could not sit down. He paced his office, stopping now and then to gaze out the window. Each time he did, he noted as many holiday details on the street below as he could from this height, and also took stock of the clouds rolling in to ease the transition from evening to night.

Each detail brought Kim to mind with the heft of a full mental takeover.

He had picked up the phone twice in the past fifteen minutes to call her, or Brenda Chang, or damn it, anyone else who knew Kim. Deep down inside him was a feeling of emptiness, of being lost and cast adrift.

He had rudely passed Alice without a word on his way to the water cooler not half an hour ago, and that had not gone down well with Alice. She had ignored him ever since.

He knew all too well the word Rory would have used for this current agitated state.
Whipped.

Did that describe him, at this point, and the sensation of being helpless to fix things in light of Kim’s fast exit?

He was acting as if she had become an obsession, when there were plenty of other women in New York, and plenty of years to find them. McKinley, with her obstinate refusal to meet his terms, was a pain in his backside.

He kept telling himself that, over and over.

In all fairness, though, she had confessed to having problems and had spoken honestly about the possibility of facing them. So, what did that make him for wishing she’d hurry up and do so, when he now knew a few of the reasons that might have contributed to how messed up she felt this time of year? Sarah Summers had been thorough with the few details she dug up for him.

Kim was alone. He sympathized with her lack of family. The Monroes were a tight clan. His mother and father were together after forty years of marriage, with a loving relationship still going strong. His sister, Shannon, had found her guy after her first year at Harvard and settled down with a ring on her finger by the time of her graduation last year. Rory was...Rory.

His family life wasn’t perfect. Whose was? Yet they were supportive in the fierceness of their loyalty to each other. Their time together, though rare these days, was always a welcome delight.

What if, like Kim, he had no family? No brothers or sisters. No mother and father to use for backup. Taking that further, what if after working hard to gain traction in his career, some newcomer suddenly threatened to derail that career?

He leaned against the windowsill, deep in thought. Kim’s father was probably alive, but lost to her. The man had filed for divorce when she was a kid. Intel said that Kim’s mother had gone in and out of hospitals after the divorce, until Deborah McKinley passed away earlier this year. Had those things—the divorce and being left by her husband—been the cause of Kim’s mother’s prolonged illness?

That would have been hard enough to take, but nothing he had found explained why this holiday in particular got to Kim, and how it got her down. He needed to know about this. He had to understand what lay at the root of her dislike for the season. If as an only child, things had been bad with her mother, had some of her mother’s depression rubbed off on Kim in ways that continued to show up?

With a quick glance at his watch, Chaz hustled out of the office, grabbing his jacket from the chair by the door. There was only one person who could help him out by filling in a few more blanks. He had to persuade Brenda to talk, knowing her to be Kim’s best friend, and that it wouldn’t be easy.

* * *

Kim climbed the stairs to her old bedroom and dropped her bag on the floor. The room smelled stale. Dust covered every available surface. The really scary thing was how nothing else had changed. Her bedroom remained exactly the same after all this time, yet another example of her late mother’s need for pattern and constancy.

“I refuse to feel bad about the state of the place. I do not live here anymore.”

She heard no answering voice in the empty house, only silence. The place felt cold. Outside temperatures had plummeted, and the inside of the house matched.

“Next stop, the furnace.” She spoke out loud to ward off the silence.

On her way downstairs, she passed her mother’s room. The door was closed, and she left it that way, preferring comfort to memory at the moment, and believing her recent mental adjustments to be good signs of being on the road to recovery.

“Thermostat up. Check.”

To her relief, the furnace kicked on. She took this as another good omen, and headed for the kitchen, which would have been in pristine condition, except for the layer of dust.

Glad now that she hadn’t turned off the electricity or gas, Kim took one good glance at the room where she and her mother had cooked and then dined at the small square table against the wall, preferring the warm kitchen to the formal dining room.

She opened a few cupboards and the refrigerator then headed upstairs for her purse. Kitchens needed to be stocked, and her stomach hadn’t stopped growling. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d eaten, or sat down for a meal. The hours spent in her apartment always seemed rushed, with lots of takeout Chinese.

She used to like to cook. Her mother, during her good spells, had taught her. Baking became her favorite, though those cookies she dumped last night had been her first foray into trying out those skills in years.
Christmas cookies...

Well, she had plenty of time now to explore her talents. With a few days off, she’d get back in the groove and whip up something good. A roast, maybe, with vegetables. She’d clean up the house and make it sparkle before putting it up for sale with the hope that some family might be happier here than she and her mother were. Like most people, she supposed houses needed love and attention in order to feel homey. She’d see to that.

But first, groceries.

She’d change her clothes, walk to the market a block over, and be back before dark if she hustled. There’d be time to thoroughly clean the kitchen after she got something in the oven. She would have to learn to slow down in measured increments. She felt all riled up. She wasn’t used to off-time from work, though her plan to fix up the house would occupy her for a while.

Plus, she was happy to note, she hadn’t thought about Monroe much in the last ten minutes. That also meant headway.

Damn his handsome hide.
She’d see to it that running away from Chaz Monroe would turn out to be productive....

* * *

“Brenda?”

She did a slow rotation in her chair and looked at Chaz warily.

“You’re working late,” he said.

“If this job was nine to five, Mr. Monroe, maybe I’d have time for a date.”

Alice had been right about Brenda, who obviously shared none of Kim’s abhorrence of the season. A miniature Christmas tree sat on her desk, wrapped with blinking lights and tiny ornaments. Tinsel garlands hung between two bookshelves. The cubicle retained a faint smell of evergreen.

Chaz waved a hand at the tree. “Does she come in here?”

“Not this time of year.” Brenda did not pretend to misunderstand whom he was talking about.

“You don’t push your ideas on her?”

“She’s my friend and has a right to her own opinions.”

Chaz sat on the edge of her desk, looking at the wall separating Kim’s cubicle from this one.

“You seem to be worried about her,” Brenda said.

“Aren’t you?”

She eyed him as if sizing him up. “She’s a big girl and will get on with her life as she sees fit.”

“She’s sad, I think.”

Brenda did not respond to his diagnosis of Kim’s state of mind.

“Do you know what problems she has with the holiday, Brenda?” he asked.

“Sorry, can’t talk about that. I promised.”

“Yet I get the impression you’d like to help her somehow.”

Brenda sighed. “Of course I’d like to help her out of the current mess she’s in. I’m not insensitive to what’s going on.”

“But you believe that nothing, other than her job here, is my business?”

“That’s right. I’m sorry.”

Chaz stood up. “Fair enough. Can you tell me something, though, that might help? Anything?”

“I doubt it. So will you fire me for protecting my friend’s privacy?”

“Only if I was the monster everyone seems to think I am.”

“Are you saying you’re not?”

He smiled. “I’m pretty hopeful that Kim might be the only one who thinks so.”

“Yet you want more information from me so that you can do what?”

“Whittle away at her resolve,” he replied.

“Which part of that resolve? The contract, or staying away from you?”

“I like her,” Chaz said. “More than I should.”

Brenda took a beat to think that over. “What makes you think whittling can work?”

“Because of something I just recalled about her apartment last night that I can’t forget.”

“What?”

“Last night her apartment smelled like cookies.”

Brenda waved a hand in the air to dismiss the remark. “That tells you something, how?”

“Sugar cookies hold a fragrance unique to this holiday in particular,” he said. “I grew up with that smell. It’s unmistakable and always makes my mouth water. Sugar cookies are a Christmas staple. Even old Claus himself can’t resist them.”

Brenda took another minute to reply. Chaz watched her mull that information over. “Could have been something else, and you are mistaken,” she suggested. “Could have been chocolate chip.”

“I’m not wrong about that one thing,” he said. “She had baked those cookies pretty near to Christmas. My question for you is if that’s usual, and if Kim bakes all the time?”

Brenda’s brow creased. Chaz noted how much she hated answering that question.

“I’ve never known her to bake anything,” she admitted.

He nodded and asked the other question plaguing him. “Then how is it that a person who shuns the season and all of its trappings would bake Christmas cookies, especially after having it out with her boss about a holiday clause in her contract?”

Brenda, Chaz realized, was not at a loss. Rebounding from the cookie inquisition, she said, “If you’re right about the cookies, it means she’s trying.”

“Trying to what?”

“Move on.”

“Regarding the holiday?”

“In regard to everything.”

Chaz glanced again at the wall between the cubicles. “Thank you, Brenda. That’s all I needed to know.”

She stopped him with a hand on his arm. “It’s not all you need to know, and I can’t tell you the rest.”

“I know about her mother,” he said. “And also about her father leaving early on.”

“Maybe you do, but the story goes much deeper than that for Kim.”

“Yet you won’t help me to understand what that story is.”

“My lips are necessarily sealed.”

“Nevertheless, it’s possible that she might be attempting to deal with change. In the elevator, she told me she wants to. You do think she is seriously open to trying?”

Brenda nodded tentatively. “I do. But you’re pushing her, you know. There’s a chance you’ll push too far.”

“I feel as though I need to get to the bottom of this. I’m not completely insensitive. I have feelings, too. I like her. I’ve admitted that. And I know how to sell a project.”

“Kim’s not a project. She’s a person.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “A special one.”

Brenda looked to the hallway. “I get that you like her, yet I’m not sure you should be poking around where you don’t belong, or that your interest can speed things up.”

“I can only try to make things better. I won’t purposefully hurt her. That much I’ll swear to you right now. Any time you want to jump in and help my cause, you’d be more than welcome.”

Brenda dropped her hand.

“I suppose,” Chaz said, “it might not be a good idea to tell Kim about this conversation. Knowing where your loyalty lies, I’m asking for your trust in the matter.”