The Secretary's Scandalous Secret Read Online Free PDF Page B

tried to equate the teenager with the woman next to him, and again that weird kick that shot through his body as if he had been suddenly hot-wired.
    ‘You mean the dress?’ she suggested in a taut voice. The very same dress she had exhibited for him, hands outstretched, vainly hoping that he might compliment her. They had reached the restaurant, but she wasn’t quite ready to drop the conversation, so when he parked and turned towards her she garnered her very small supply of courage and stayedput, arms folded, her full mouth flattened into a thin line. ‘I’m not ready to go in just yet.’
    ‘Pre-dinner nerves? Don’t worry. If he’s that good-looking, that charming and that interested in every word you have to say, I’m sure you’re in for a scintillating evening.’
    ‘It’s not pre-dinner nerves. It’s…it’s
you!
‘
    ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’
    ‘You haven’t said one nice thing to me all evening. I know you would never have employed me to work for your company. I know you’ve been forced to help me out because you think you owe my family a favour—which you don’t, but you could at least
try
and be nice. You’ve told me that I’m no good at what I do…’
    She tabulated all her points by sticking up her fingers one by one. ‘You’ve told me that the clothes I wear to work are horrendous because I don’t wear that uniform of tight suits and high heels, even though I’m hidden away most of the time. I need to invest in a new wardrobe just in case someone important sees me and falls into a dead faint, I suppose. You’ve told me that I wouldn’t have a clue how to look after myself in a place like London, you’ve told me how awful my bedsit is, and now? Now you sit there telling me that I look
fat!’
    Listing all those slights out loud hadn’t been a good idea. Taken one at a time, she could reason them away, but faced with all of them in their entirety was just too much. A wave of forlorn self-pity rushed over her; her eyes began to leak and it wasn’t long before the leak became a flood. When she found a handkerchief pressed into her hands, she accepted it gratefully and dabbed her eyes as her silly crying jag was reduced to the odd hiccup.
    Embarrassment replaced self-pity. She blew her nose and stuffed the hankie into her bag.
    ‘Sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry. I must be nervous; you’re right.’
    ‘I should be the one apologising.’ Luc had no time for weeping, wailing women, but for some reason the sight of Agatha in floods of tears had struck right to the heart of him. Hearing her neat little summary of everything he had said to her over the course of the evening had not been one of his proudest moments.
    ‘It’s okay,’ she whispered, desperate to remove herself from his presence where seconds before she had wanted to stay and speak her mind. She tilted her face to him. ‘Do I look a mess? I bet my make-up’s everywhere. What’s he going to think?’ She gave a wobbly laugh.
    ‘That you’ve got amazing eyes and that you’re anything but fat,’ he said roughly.
    And just like that the atmosphere altered with sudden, sizzling electricity. It was as if the world had suddenly shrunk to the small space between them. She thought she could actually hear the rush of blood through her veins but then she realised that she was just imagining it. Thinking straight, this was the man who hadn’t had a good word to say to her.
    ‘You don’t have to say that.’
    ‘No. I don’t.’ But his voice had changed imperceptibly. ‘But, just for the record, you do have amazing eyes, and when I said that you’re a big girl now I didn’t mean it in the literal sense.’
    ‘You didn’t?’
    ‘I meant you’ve grown up. That dress makes you look sexy.’
    ‘Sexy? Me?’
    ‘You. Why do you sound so shocked?’
    Because you’re saying it,
she thought, while her face burnt and her pulses raced and her heart sang. ‘Let’s hopeStewart agrees!’ Just in case those