Carla Cassidy - Her Secret, His Duty

“That’s the problem.” That tiny crease deepened again across her forehead. “I’m fairly sure that the Capital Hotel ballroom will be impossible to get at this late date. I’ll check with the Regent and see what’s available. Last I heard the ballroom was undergoing some renovations and I’m not certain if they are complete or not. I’m still not sure I’m going to be able to make this happen so soon. I’m assuming you want a Saturday night?”

“Or a Friday night would be fine,” he replied. He watched as she made several notes on the pad. Debra Prentice wasn’t a knockout kind of woman, but she also didn’t play up her pretty features. She wore little makeup and her hair always looked as if it had been tortured into a position at the back of her head that it couldn’t possibly hold.

Still, he knew that her light brown hair was incredibly silky and that she had a cute, perfectly proportioned figure that had fit perfectly in his arms. He knew how her eyes sparkled while in the throes of passion and exactly how her lips tasted.

“Trey?” Her eyes held a touch of impatience, making him realize she must have tried to get his attention while he’d been lost in thought.

“Sorry. What was the question?”

“How many people are you expecting to invite?”

“Two hundred or maybe two hundred and fifty,” he replied.

“Pick a number,” she said with a light edge to her voice. “I need a specific number to tell the event planner when we settle where this is going take place.”

“Two hundred and fifty,” he said firmly.

She nodded. “I’ll need the guest list from you as soon as possible. Invitations will have to go out in the next couple of days or so. Thank goodness it’s January and there isn’t much else going on around town.” She wrote a couple more notes on her pad and then met his gaze again. “I think that’s all I need from you to get started. By the end of the day I’ll have a list of dates and places for you to consider.”

She stood as if dismissing him, her body instantly poised to run back to her little office.

“Then tomorrow let’s make arrangements to see some of the venues together,” he said as he also stood. “And I’ll want to be with you when you speak to the event planner. We’ll need to pick the menu and make decisions on a number of other things.”

It was obvious he’d surprised her. She’d probably just assumed everything would be left up to her. But Trey freely admitted that he was something of a control freak. He couldn’t run Adair Enterprises and be as successful as he’d been without being detail oriented and on top of every element in his life.

“I just assumed...” Her voice trailed off.

“This is important to me, Debra. Assume that I’ll be at your side every step of the way until this dinner party is over.”

Her eyes widened slightly and then she gave him a curt, professional nod. “Then I’ll call you later this evening and we’ll make arrangements for tomorrow.”

She left the sitting room and Trey sank back into the chair, his thoughts a riot inside his head. He’d taken over the running of the family business when his grandfather had died. Walt Winston had mentored Trey and instilled in him the need to be the best that he could be.

It was Walt who’d wanted to see Trey in politics. The old man had even made a list of women he thought would be an asset in his quest for public office. At thirty-five years old, Trey knew it was time for him to marry. He also knew he’d make a more attractive candidate if he had a wife by his side.

With that thought in mind he’d dated dozens of women over the past year and finally eight months ago he’d begun to see Cecily McKenna exclusively.

Although he wasn’t madly in love with Cecily, he knew she’d make the perfect wife for him. She was a thirty-three-year-old heiress. Articulate, charming and beautiful, Cecily also possessed a fierce ambition not just for herself, but for him, as well.

He knew there were rumors swirling of an imminent engagement between him and Cecily, rumors he suspected Cecily had started herself. He smiled inwardly. He wouldn’t put it past her.

He looked up as Sam came into the room. “So, word has it that you’re joining the ranks of the sex-scandal-ridden, fake and crooked politicians of the world.” Sam threw himself into the chair that Debra had vacated.

It was obvious his brother was in one of his foul moods. “Actually, I’m hoping to do something good for the people of North Carolina.”

“That’s my big brother, the overachieving perfect son.”

Trey drew a steadying breath. He knew the man seated before him with the scowl on his handsome face wasn’t the brother, wasn’t the man who had left here to serve his country.

“Sam, why don’t you talk to me?” he asked softly. Sam had spent three months imprisoned overseas and months in a hospital recovering from the severe torture he’d endured while a prisoner. He had since been deemed unfit to return to duty and had been mad at the world ever since.

“I don’t need to talk to anyone,” Sam growled and got up from the chair. “I’m fine just the way I am.”

Trey watched helplessly, troubled for his brother as Sam left the room. Sam was a powder keg, but he refused to speak about his time in prison or what had been done to him. The scars he carried were deep and dark and Trey wished he’d share some of the horror with somebody...anybody who could help him heal.

Unfortunately, Sam wouldn’t be fixed until Sam wanted to be fixed and at the moment he appeared to be perfectly satisfied being angry.

Trey checked his watch and stood. It was time for him to get back to his own office. Now that he’d pretty much made up his mind to run for Senator, he didn’t want to just run, he wanted to win.

He also needed to call Cecily. He hadn’t even told her yet that he’d made up his mind to begin the process of gaining support and throwing his hat in the ring. She would be beyond thrilled. She’d been telling him for months that he was what the state needed, that he could do great things.

As he left the house he found himself wondering what Debra thought of his decision to run. Did she believe he was capable of doing great things?

Who cares what she thinks? he asked himself. All he needed from her was her skills at pulling together an event that would provide him a solid foundation on which to begin to build his campaign.

Chapter 2

Debra had suffered a crush on Trey Winston from the very first time she’d met him years ago. She’d always known he was out of her league, but her crush had never really diminished over the years.

She couldn’t help the fact that her heart always leapt a bit at the sight of him, that she often grew tongue-tied and clumsy in his presence. Even sharing the single night that they’d had together hadn’t changed her attraction to him; instead it had only deepened her feelings for Trey.

But, it didn’t matter what she felt about him because she knew that she was the last woman on earth he would ever want to have a public relationship with. He had his future neatly planned out with Cecily McKenna by his side.

As she drove to the Regent Hotel to meet both him and the hotel manager to discuss the event, she couldn’t halt the tingling nerves that fluttered through her veins at the thought of working with him so closely.

She knew he’d probably marry Cecily, a gorgeous heiress who had the social savvy and political chops to be an asset to him.

Debra also knew that she would be a definite liability to Trey. She’d been born out of wedlock. Her father, who had been a married CEO of a Fortune 500 company at the time, had never acknowledged her existence personally. In fact, Debra had been raised by her mother to never mention her father’s name, to never expect anything but a monthly support check in the mail from him.