Emily McKay - Seduced - The Unexpected Virgin

As soon as the words left her mouth, she snapped her mouth closed, wishing she could take them back. Jeez, of all the people to gripe to … Why’d she pick one of the two people who could summarily fire her? The board held her job in their hands. Emma would never vote to fire her, but if Ward persuaded Rafe, they’d have the majority.

But when she met his gaze, there was more understanding there than censure. His lips were twisted in a wry smile. His eyebrows lifted slightly.

“Don’t get me wrong. I’m not afraid of hard work. I’m not even afraid of failing. I just don’t want to disappoint others. In the four years I worked in Hollywood, I dealt with some of the most difficult personalities in the industry. After that, I was so sure I could handle anything.” Now she did laugh as she admitted, “God, I hate being wrong.”

He walked to where she was, then gently turned her to face him. “You weren’t wrong. You can do this.”

The fervor in his eyes, the sheer conviction nearly took her breath away. She was struck all over again by how handsome he was. By the fact that Ward Miller—Ward Freakin’ Miller—was here, mere inches away from her. Talking to her like a colleague. She shook it off. This was so not the time to wallow in his intense sexual appeal.

Abruptly, he dropped his hands and shoved them into his back pockets. “I remember all too well how hard it was to get CMF started. Sure, I had staff. I had hired the best people in the business, but I wanted to do most of it myself. I needed something to keep me busy.”

She found herself practically holding her breath. It had been three years since his wife had died. Still, she didn’t imagine that was something you ever got over.

She’d looked him up on Google when Emma first called to tell her he was the third board member. After carefully tucking all her girlish fantasies back away, she’d realized that she knew very little about what he’d been doing in life since he’d disappeared from the public eye.

The web had enough details about Cara’s death to satisfy the most morbidly curious, up to and including Ward’s last words to her.

She’d been so disgusted by the invasion of his privacy that she’d immediately closed the window, feeling a bit unsavory for reading even as much as she had. Losing a loved one was hard enough, but to have your grief splattered all over the tabloids for public consumption, that was … well, just unimaginable.

“It must have been extremely hard to lose her,” she said now.

He nodded, his expression patient, somehow accepting of her awkward, fumbling condolences. “If I could start CMF,” he continued, “then so can you. That’s why I’m here to help.”

But she shook her head. “It’s enough that you’re on the board, that you’re being the face of Hannah’s Hope. I’m certainly not going to ask you to do my job on top of that.”

“I’m not doing your job,” he argued. “I’m doing my job.”

“I don’t understand.”

He smiled at her obvious confusion. “You don’t know what CMF does, do you?”

“It provides healthcare for impoverished children.”

“That’s half of what the Cara Miller Foundation does.” His grin lit with mischief. Like he was about to share a secret. She felt herself leaning toward him. “When I started CMF, that was my intent. But along the way I realized how hard it was to start a nonprofit. I quickly realized that without the financial and personal resources I had, I never would have gotten anywhere. That’s why I started the other branch of CMF.”

She frowned. “The other branch?”

“Yes. Helping kids was Cara’s thing. But that’s not what really excites me.”

“What is?” Heat flooded her cheeks as she realized the double meaning behind her question. But she quickly forced her embarrassment aside. Yes, there seemed to be an attraction simmering between them, but he seemed determined to ignore it. And if he could, then she certainly could, too.

She forced her attention to the topic at hand. She’d thought she knew exactly what the Cara Miller Foundation did. She’d thought she knew exactly why he was here. Just to provide a glamorous face to promote Hannah’s Hope. Had she been wrong?

“I’ve lost you, haven’t I?”

“A little bit,” she admitted, chagrined because he seemed to read her as easily as if she had thought bubbles dangling over her head.

“Let me back up. Have you ever heard the term business incubator? ”

“I think so.” She’d read an article in the paper not too long ago about them. “They’re companies whose sole purpose is to help new companies get started, right? “

“Exactly. The secondary branch of the Cara Miller Foundation—the branch that doesn’t get a lot of publicity and isn’t in the news all the time—is a nonprofit incubator. We find people with great intentions and dedicated personnel and we help them get their nonprofit off the ground. We don’t do the work for people, we just provide them with the training and resources they need to get the job done.”

“I had no idea such a thing even existed.” Surprise—no, to be honest it was out-and-out shock—washed over her. “How did I not know this?”

“I don’t know.” For a second he looked as baffled as she felt. Then he quickly shrugged it off. “Rafe certainly knew. It’s why he asked me to be on the board.”

“Yes, and he’s been such a font of information,” she muttered drily. “If that’s why you’re here, I should have been told that before you showed up.” Her indignation crept into her voice. She didn’t like being kept out of the loop.

“I thought you were.”

“Well, I wasn’t and—” But she broke off, frowning as she tried to summon up exactly how the conversation had gone the night Emma had called with the information about Ward coming.

What had Emma said about Ward? Had she even really listened to Emma’s explanation? There’d probably been a solid thirty seconds during which Ana had dropped the phone and silently squealed in excitement.

And then, a few minutes later, it had really hit her. Ward Miller. Working with her. But working for Rafe.

Her excitement had given way to unease. All of her reallife knowledge of celebrities had slammed head-on into her fandom. To do her job, she’d have to bury her fantasies. To protect Hannah’s Hope, she’d have to be suspicious of his every action. She’d have to set aside everything she wanted to believe about him.

Throughout that epiphany, Emma had kept on talking, possibly explaining exactly everything Ward was bringing to the table. And Ana’s cynicism had made her miss it.

Now, she cringed. “It’s possible that Emma explained everything and I just didn’t hear her.” She sighed, massaging the tension in her forehead with her fingers. “That must be what happened. Emma wouldn’t have purposefully left it out.”

Emma put her heart and soul into her charity work. Which was why making sure Hannah’s Hope flourished was so important. Ana couldn’t bear to let Emma down. And knowing what she knew now, she didn’t want to let Ward down, either. If he wasn’t going to immediately kick her sorry butt to the curb, if he was going to give her another chance, she was going to grab it with both hands and never let it go.

Full of renewed resolve, she straightened. “Okay, Mr. Nonprofit Incubator, you’re the expert. Where do we go from here? “

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