The Plus-One Agreement (17 page)

He was actually admitting it!

‘I didn’t do this,’ she repeated but, even to her own ears, she was beginning to sound like the little girl who, despite the frosting around her mouth, had refused to own up to eating two of the cupcakes her mother had made for a charity coffee morning.

‘I’m sorry, Natasha, but if you refuse to cooperate we’ll have no choice but to dismiss you without notice for bringing the firm into disrepute.’ He took refuge behind his desk before he added, ‘If you force us to do that we will, of course, have no option but to counter-sue you for malicious damage.’

Deep, deep trouble.

‘I’m not sick,’ she replied, doing her best to keep her voice steady, fighting down the scream of outrage that was beginning to build low in her belly. ‘As for the suit for damages, I doubt either you or Mr Hadley would get very far with a jury. While the advertisement may not have been what he signed up for—’ she was being thrown to the wolves, used as a scapegoat for something she hadn’t done and she had nothing to lose ‘—it’s the plain unvarnished truth.’

‘Apart from the woodworm and the stairs,’ he reminded her stonily.

‘Are you prepared to gamble on that?’ she demanded. ‘Who knows what’s under all that dirt?’

She didn’t wait for a response. Once your boss had offered you a choice between loony and legal action, any meaningful dialogue was at an end.

Copyright © 2014 by Liz Fielding

ISBN-13: 9781460327500

THE PLUS-ONE AGREEMENT

Copyright © 2014 by Charlotte Phillips

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