Alison Fraser - The Boss's Secret Mistress

Lucas made an exasperated sound. “That’s not what I meant, and you know it! Can’t you forget our respective positions for a single moment?”

“No, since you ask, I can’t forget. Neither would you, I imagine, if you were in my position.”

“Underneath me?” he suggested.

“Yes!” She’d walked right into it.

“If only you were.” His eyes made a leisurely trip down her body and back again. The elevator arrived and Lucas stepped in with her. Tory wanted to step out again, but it seemed an act of cowardice. What could he do in the five seconds it took for the elevator to reach the ground floor?

He could hit the emergency button. Tory didn’t realize that was what he’d done until the elevator lurched to a halt.

“You can’t do that!”

He grinned. “For now, let’s talk.”

“I don’t want to talk.”

He drawled, “Fair enough. Let’s not talk.” And with one step he closed the distance between them….

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CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

‘LUCAS RYECART?’ Tory repeated the name, but it meant nothing to her.

‘You must have heard of him,’ Simon Dixon insisted. ‘American entrepreneur, bought up Howard Productions and Chelton TV last year.’

‘I think I’d remember a name like that,’ Tory told her fellow production assistant. ‘Anyway, I’m not interested in the wheeling and dealing of money men. If Eastwich needs an injection of cash, does it matter where it comes from?’

‘If it means one of us ending up at the local job centre,’ Simon warned dramatically, ‘then, yes, I’d say it matters.’

‘That’s only rumour.’ Tory knew from personal experience that rumours bore little relationship to the truth.

‘Don’t be so sure. Do you know what they called him at Howard Productions?’ It was a rhetoric question as Simon took lugubrious pleasure in announcing, ‘The Grim Reaper.’

This time Tory laughed in disbelief. After a year in Documentary Affairs at Eastwich Productions, she knew Simon well enough. If there wasn’t drama already in a situation, he would do his best to inject it. He was such a stirrer people called him The Chef.

‘Simon, are you aware of your nickname?’ she couldn’t resist asking now.

‘Of course.’ He smiled as he countered, ‘Are you?’

Tory shrugged. She wasn’t, but supposed she had one.

‘The Ice Maiden.’ It was scarcely original. ‘Because of your cool personality, do you think?’

‘Undoubtedly,’ agreed Tory, well aware of the real reason.

‘Still, it’s unlikely that you’ll fall victim to staff cuts,’ Simon continued to muse. ‘I mean, what man can resist Shirley Temple hair, eyes like Bambi and more than a passing resemblance to what’s-her-name in Pretty Woman?’

Tory pulled a face at Simon’s tongue-in-cheek assessment of her looks. ‘Anyone who prefers blonde supermodel types…Not to mention those of an entirely different persuasion.’

‘I should be so lucky,’ he acknowledged in camp fashion, before disclaiming, ‘No, this one’s definitely straight. In fact, he has been described as God’s gift to women.’

‘Really.’ Tory remained unimpressed. ‘I thought that was some rock singer.’

‘I’m sure God is capable of bestowing more than one gift to womankind,’ Simon declared, ‘if only to make up for the many disadvantages he’s given you.’

Tory laughed, unaffected by Simon’s anti-women remarks. Simon was anti most things.

‘Anyway, I think we can safely assume, with a little judicious eyelash-batting, you’ll achieve job security,’ he ran on glibly, ‘so that leaves myself or our beloved leader, Alexander the Not-so-Great. Who would you put your money on, Tory dearest?’

‘I have no idea.’ Tory began to grow impatient with Simon and his speculations. ‘But if you’re that worried, perhaps you should apply yourself to some work on the remote chance this Ryecart character comes to survey his latest acquisition.’

This was said in the hope that Simon would allow her to get on with her own work. Oblivious, Simon remained seated on the edge of her desk, dangling an elegantly shod foot over one side.

‘Not so remote,’ he warned. ‘The grapevine has him due at eleven hundred hours to inspect the troops.’

‘Oh.’ Tory began to wonder how reliable the rest of his information was. Would Eastwich Productions be subject to some downsizing?

‘Bound to be Alex,’ Simon resumed smugly. ‘He’s been over the hill and far away for some months now.’

Tory was really annoyed this time. ‘That’s not true. He’s just had a few problems to sort out.’

‘A few!’ Simon scoffed at this understatement. ‘His wife runs off to Scotland. His house is repossessed. And his breath smells like an advert for Polo mints… We do know what that means, Goldilocks?’

At times Tory found Simon amusing. This wasn’t one of them. She was quite aware Alex, their boss, had a drink problem. She just didn’t believe in kicking people when they were down.

‘You’re not going to do the dirty on Alex, are you, Simon?’

‘Moi? Would I do something like that?’

‘Yes.’ She was certain of it.

‘You’ve cut me to the quick.’ He clasped his heart in theatrical fashion. ‘Why should I do down Alex…especially when he can do it so much better himself, don’t you think?’

True enough, Tory supposed. Alex was sliding downhill so fast he could have won a place on an Olympic bobsleigh team.

‘Anyway, I’ll toddle off back to my desk—’ Simon suited actions to his words ‘—and sharpen wits and pencil before our American friend arrives.’

Tory frowned. ‘Has Alex come in yet?’

‘Is the Pope a Muslim?’ he answered flippantly, then shook his head as Tory picked up the phone. ‘I shouldn’t bother if I were you.’

But Tory felt some loyalty to Alex. He had given her her job at Eastwich.

She rang his mistress’s flat, then every other number she could possibly think of, in the vain hope of finding Alex before Eastwich’s new boss descended on them.

‘Too late, ma petite,’ Simon announced with satisfaction as Colin Mathieson, the senior production executive, appeared at the glass door of their office. He gave a brief courtesy knock before entering. A stranger who had to be the American followed him.

He wasn’t at all what Tory had expected. She’d been prepared for a sharp-suited, forty something year old with a sun-bed tan and a roving eye.

That was why she stared. Well, that was what she told herself later. At the time she just stared.