Tempting The Boss (6 page)

“Hmm...” Victoria had always enjoyed dogs, but never had one. Her father never had time to care for one and, if she were honest with herself, she didn’t have time for one either. ““So Katy is rather independent, I take it?”

Dean grunted. “She’s a sixteen-year-old girl. What do you expect?”

Victoria let out a huff. She didn’t need to put up with his bad mood all week. “Is there a problem?”

He looked over, as though surprised she’d even ask.

“I can get on the plane alone. You volunteered for this task, so if you can’t stand the idea of being in close quarters with me, speak now.”

He tightened his lips. “No…this isn’t about you. It’s just……I always do this somehow. Things are going fine with Katy and then right as I’m about to leave, I give her reminders and she gets pissed. But what the hell am I supposed to do? I don’t know what she remembers.””

Victoria felt bad for bringing it up and felt even worse that she’d assumed his bad mood had something to do with her. She was supposed to spend three days with this man and she was already being crazy. Which was especially strange because she was used to being the sane person in the room.

She kept her mouth shut for most of the remaining ride, taking the chance to respond to a few emails on her phone and make sure the office wouldn’t fall apart when she was gone.

Going through the busy airport with Dean at her side was definitely an experience. She’d forgotten the novelty of being excited by the airport and how intense security was for someone not used to it. As security patted him down because of the wallet and cell phone he never took out of his pocket, Victoria couldn’t knock the smile off her face.

But the best of all was seeing his face as they were the first allowed to board the plane. He kept looking at his ticket and back to the tiny numbers over their row. “We’re in first class?” he asked incredulously.

The corner of her mouth hooked up. “Well, the media thinks I’m snobbish if I take a private charter.”

He shook his head as he tucked his bag in the overhead bin, followed by hers.

Victoria glanced at the window seat and back to Dean. “Did you want the room with the view?”

“Whatever you want.” He motioned her to make up her mind.

“Are you still grumpy?” She slid into the window seat. If he was going to be surly, he’d have to take the aisle. She could enjoy the view all she wanted that way.

He sat next to her and fumbled with the seatbelt, jamming it into place as quickly as possible.

She let out another laugh and he glared at her. “Would you please stop enjoying this so much?”

“What? It’s funny! You’re supposed to be my big, bad bodyguard and you’re afraid of flying.”

He grunted and shifted in his seat as the rest of the passengers piled into the plane.

Victoria patted his leg gently. “Just relax. It’s a short flight.” It was only then she realized that she’d never set the armrest down. She jerked her hand back and looked at it. If she put it down now, he’d know she felt strange touching him.

Why the hell would she pat him on the leg?
They were supposed to be in a business relationship. He was doing her a favor until the background checks came through on the true muscle. She wasn’t supposed to be touching him or laughing as if they were friends.

She bit her lip and looked out the window to the boring runway. One of the perks of boarding first was that she got to sit on the plane the longest before takeoff. Everything in her wanted to turn back to Dean, but she refused.

So what if he was big and attractive and, okay, she’d admit it: he was sexy as hell and sitting right next to her with no armrest between them. This was a bad idea. It was one thing to have a completely inexperienced bodyguard. But he seemed to need the money, it was easy to explain his presence, and, in the extremely slight chance that someone tried to kill her two times in one week, he was definitely an intimidating presence.

And here she was, putting her hand on him. Maybe she should just put him on the next plane back to New York as soon as they landed. Tell him thanks, but no thanks.

She finally gave in and glanced over to Dean, who was scrolling through his phone. A quick glance and she could see that he was texting Katy, but couldn’t read what they were texting about.

Everything about him was strong: His hands. His arms. His thighs that seemed to take up the entire first class seat.

And she knew from the few times she’d touched him that that mass was from muscle.
Had she ever been with someone like that?
Her past lovers had been scholars. The closest to a “jock”” that she’d been with had been a runner with a long, lean build.
If she could have just a night alone with Dean…

But she would. She and Dean would be sleeping just a wall away from each other for the next two nights. If there was ever a good time for an affair, this was it.

Out of town, away from Terry and her sick father. She smiled at the strange turn of her thoughts.
What was she even thinking?
It was fantastic that she’d decided to screw the bodyguard, but he’d never once implied he was interested in her. For all she knew, he had a girlfriend.

Dean set his phone down as the flight attendant went through the pre-flight safety measures and announced takeoff was soon.

Victoria bit her lip as she waited for the woman to stop acting out how to use the breathing mask. She’d seen this speech enough to have it memorized, so she tried to think of the best way to seduce Dean. She hadn’t brought any particularly sexy clothes, and Dean was going wherever she went, so she wouldn’t have time to stop at any lingerie stores. So she’d just have to rely on her own charm and the plain white bra she was wearing.

Her chances of getting laid weren’t looking great. She wasn’t known for her charm. She was known for being a hard ass who liked to make it known when she was the smartest person in the room.

The poor guy had his hands fisted tightly in his lap, and Victoria felt as if she needed to stop thinking about her (lack of) seduction skills and try to distract him. “So what was Katy saying?” she asked as the plane started to move.

He jerked at her question. “Huh?”

She gave him a comforting smile. “I peeked at your phone. I saw it was your sister. Is she mad?”

“Oh, no. She was just sending me a picture she thought was funny.”

“Yeah? Was it your dog?”

He snorted. Some of the tension left his body. “No. She knows I’m not a fan of planes so she sent me her ‘fear of flying cure.’’”

Victoria raised a brow. “Oh really?”

“Bottle of Jack Daniels.”

“Smart sixteen-year-old. Let’s hope she’s not talking from experience.”

Dean shook his head. “Nah. She’s a good kid. Mean sense of humor, but I got lucky with her.”

“And you did it all on your own, right? That’s pretty admirable.”

He shrugged. “We both had to make the best of a bad situation. I learned as I went.”

“How old were you?” He took a deep breath and she backpedaled. “It’s a personal question. You don’t have to—”

“It’s fine,” he interjected. “Katy was six and I was eighteen.”” There was a note of wistfulness in his voice, but it seemed as if he’d told the story enough times before to not get too worked up over it.

“I’m so sorry. It’s hard enough to think about losing Dad now. I can’t imagine going through that with both parents when you were so young.”

His jaw clenched as his eyes went to the seat in front of him. Victoria rested her forehead in her palm.
Good grief.
She was trying to seduce the man, and the first thing she did was bring up his dead parents. At this rate, not only would she never get Dean into bed, she’d probably never have sex again.

“Obviously I never thought I’d have to raise a kid at that age, but to be honest, I don’t know if I would’ve gotten through it without her. I was strong for her. She was strong for me. And that’s kind of how it’s been ever since.”

“That’s really sweet,” she said honestly. Even though she was sure she was turning him off more and more by the second, she couldn’’t help but appreciate the love he had for his sister. No matter how great he said Katy was, Victoria knew that her success was greatly attributable to what Dean had done.

“I was raised by a strong man too, so I’m sure Katy is going to kick ass once she’s out of college,” said Victoria.

Dean’s brow creased. “Your mom wasn’t in the picture?”

She shook her head. “Nope. She divorced my dad when Terry and I were still in elementary school. Part of the settlement was that she’d never see us again.”

His eyes widened. “What? Who agrees to that?”

She was glad he was shocked, because she’d never been too happy about that little detail either. “It’s true. I broke into my dad’’s safe when I was a senior in high school to read over the papers myself. I know exactly what you have to pay someone to never have anything to do with me again. Funny enough, that was how I met Mr. Jack Daniels.”

“Well, you turned out okay,” he assured her, giving her a once-over.

Victoria felt heat rush through her but refused to turn away. Instead, she met his eyes. “I’m glad you approve.”

Just like that, it happened. His friendly look turned deeper, hotter, as his eyes briefly fell to her lips. But as quick as it started, it was over and he sat back in his seat, leaving Victoria to wonder whether she’d imagined it all.

“So what’s on the agenda this week?” he asked.

She sighed and let her head fall back. Any seducing would have to wait until she had more room to do something about it. “It’s a plant visit. We’re always looking for a good deal on American properties, and this particular plant is for sale. We’ve been in preliminary talks with the owners. The place is hemorrhaging money at the moment, but I have ideas to turn it around.”

“Ideas?”

“You’ve been to Green & Sons stores before, right?” He nodded. “So most of the product is supplied by vendors, but we do have some lower-cost items with our own brand on them. Some tools, and a lot of smaller items like nuts, screws, and bolts. That’s what this plant makes. The tiny things.”

“And how are you going to turn the place around?”

“Well, to make a nut, you start out with a long, solid piece of metal. You run it through a machine and it cuts away until you have the shape you need. In the process, over half of the original rod is cut away. I am adding a scrapping system into the plant so ninety percent of the scrap can be collected and resold. It will save millions of dollars every year, but will also cost millions to install on top of the price of the plant to begin with. So we’re meeting with the plant manager today, and tomorrow, the companies who will be giving estimates for the scrap project will be touring the plant. I need those estimates before I can give the go-ahead to make the purchase.”

“That sounds…”

“Boring?” she guessed.

“No. Interesting. I never really thought about all that goes into making a screw.”

She grinned. “Those little bastards are more complicated than you might think.”

CHAPTER SIX

Dean set down his bag and looked around the room. It wasn’t really what he was expecting. He’d stayed at some pretty swanky hotels while helping Grace, as booking for her employees was normally part of her contracted fee, but this hotel wasn’’t at all fancy.

Not that it was bad. It was clean, had a king bed, mini fridge, microwave, bath/shower combo, and a small sitting area. It was the plainness that surprised him.

Victoria was loaded. She was rich before she became CEO of a multibillion-dollar corporation and made millions upon millions every year. She was in the room right through the connecting door, so it wasn’t as if she was staying in the presidential suite.

No. She flew on a normal plane, albeit in first class, and slept in a normal hotel room. But she was so much more than normal in person.

He’d shadowed her all day. She’d introduced him as a contractor who was there to give her his second opinion on the estimates she was gathering, so no one questioned his presence. She talked the same way to the guys working the packaging lines down on the plant floor as she did to the plant manager who had so eagerly greeted them in his best suit and tie.

She didn’t just have money. She worked for it. She listened intently when someone talked and somehow seemed able to cut through the bullshit to get to what was really being said to her.

He set his duffel on the bed and rolled his shoulders. It was six p.m. The plant workers went home at precisely five, management stayed a bit later to talk to Victoria, and it had been a five-minute drive to the hotel.

Now he had a good four hours to kill. They needed to be back at the plant by six a.m. to see the startup operations, but he normally got five hours or less of sleep. If he was in bed by ten, this would be a vacation for him.

He kicked off the tennis shoes, thankful that this wasn’t the type of gig that required fancy loafers. The floor in the plant was hard, and it sounded as though there might be lots of walking tomorrow. He undid the buttons of his blue button-down shirt and set it on the bed, careful not to wrinkle it.