The Seduction Scheme Read Online Free PDF Page B

says.’ There was amusement rather than offence in his deep warm voice. ‘A man who tells you what to wear will likely tell you what to think if you give him the chance. Goodnight, Rachel.’
    â€˜I won’t let anyone do that.’
    â€˜Good girl.’ He took her chin in his hand and placed his warm lips over hers. If this chaste salute was meant to keep her wanting more, it worked! The sensual impact left her body so taut and strung out, she might well have responded like some sex-starved idiot if he’d touched her again. He didn’t.
    â€˜I won’t say goodbye. I think we’ll meet again very soon.’
    Rachel watched him go with a dazed expression. She knew they were just words, but it didn’t stop her wondering just what she’d do if he turned up on her doorstep one day.

CHAPTER TWO
    â€˜O H , WELL , if she’s on loan from Albert at least she’ll be easy on the eye.’ Benedict’s mouth twisted into a dissatisfied grimace. He wasn’t happy at the idea of working with a stranger; Maggie’s anticipation of his needs bordered on the psychic. ‘All the same, Mags, I think it’s pretty mean of you to desert me on my first day back.’
    â€˜I could stay to hold your hand if your sojourn down under has turned you soft. I don’t understand a word of German, but I could look intelligent.’ His secretary cast him an unsympathetic glance as she continued to flick through a file. ‘Here it is! I don’t know how it got there!’ she exclaimed, retrieving a sheaf of papers. ‘I want to leave everything as it should be for Rachel.’
    The reminder of a familiar name brought a reminiscent smile to his lips. ‘Would you really do that for me—cancel your holiday?’
    â€˜No, I can’t wait to kick off the dust of this place,’ came the frank rejoinder.
    â€˜So nice to see someone who enjoys her work.’
    â€˜Huh! Listen to who’s talking. I didn’t see you hurrying back. Besides—’ the fashionable specs were pushed firmly up her retroussé nose ‘—I’m a legal secretary, not a slave—subtle difference, I know, but…’
    Benedict sat down on the edge of his desk. ‘PA sounds much more dynamic.’
    â€˜I’m not feeling too dynamic right now.’
    â€˜You’d really prefer to lie on a tropical beach with your husband than stay here?’ he said incredulously.
    â€˜Call me peculiar… Ah, is that you, Rachel? Come along in!’ she yelled as she heard a sound in the adjoining room. ‘Rachel French, this is Benedict Arden. You probably haven’t met; I think he was on walkabout when you started.’
    Disbelief froze the polite smile on Rachel’s lips. The possibility that she’d met a doppelgänger or long-lost identical twin was speedily dismissed— it was him.
    Rachel wasn’t sure how long the shock lasted or when it became full-blown fury. A wave of humiliation fanned the flames of her anger. Her thoughts all ended in a big question mark. Sick joke…? Well, whatever it had been she’d certainly been sucked in.
    â€˜Well, I’ll leave you two to it. I’ve already shown Rachel the layout and I’ve warned her you’ll work her to a shadow of her former self, and unlike me Rachel needs all the pounds she’s got! So be nice to her.’ She glared at her employer, affection thinly concealed beneath the spiky exterior.
    â€˜I will, Mags.’ This could work out quite beautifully—then again maybe not, he thought, meeting the frozen hostility of his new assistant’s eyes.
    â€˜He works so hard himself he doesn’t realise the rest of us have a social life.’
    Maggie hadn’t noticed anything, Rachel realised incredulously. She maintained her tight-lipped silence; if she said what she wanted to she just might lose her job! Screaming abuse at the big boss’s son