Lynne Graham: The Mistresses Collection

Emmie pressed the door shut and turned back, a shiver of disconcerting awareness filtering through her tall, slender length as she met his keen, intelligent eyes. Beautiful eyes, she thought absently, as arrestingly bright as starlight in that strong face. Her body betrayed her instantly as if, having found the chink in her armour with this one man, it had forced that tiny loophole into a dangerous crack, for her breasts stirred and swelled heavily within her bra so that it felt tight and uncomfortable. Her colour fluctuated as her nipples stung into straining peaks and suddenly she was as tongue-tied as an awkward adolescent.

‘Miss Marshall,’ Bastian drawled, tracking her every change of expression. ‘Or may I call you Emmie?’

‘Emmie’s fine,’ she muttered at the height of a drawn-in breath.

‘Or do you prefer Emerald?’

Taken aback by that rare use of her baptismal name, Emmie hovered uncertainly. ‘I don’t use that name…’

‘You…don’t?’ A winged ebony brow climbed as though she had surprised him and when he bent his head over the laptop on the desk, it was a relief for her to have a moment to catch her breath again while watching the light from the window behind her gleam over the glossy sheen of his luxuriant black hair.

Catching herself on that thought, she didn’t know what was wrong with her and only wished she could kick her brain back into gear. Yes, he was a good-looking guy but that didn’t impress her, it being her experience that handsome men were usually very aware that they were handsome and invariably offended if a woman didn’t react with admiration. Not that Bastian Christou struck her as belonging to that category, she acknowledged grudgingly. She was of such minuscule importance on his scale that she was sure he couldn’t care less how she reacted to him. No, it was her own self and her pride that were affronted by her breathless, nervous state in his presence. A grown woman didn’t lose her ability to reason around an attractive man, at least not if she expected to be taken seriously as an employee in an executive office that was still very much a man’s world.

‘No, I don’t use that name…never have,’ Emmie proclaimed with a strained smile, recalling that he could only have got that name from her job application because she only employed it when officialdom required it. Perhaps it had lingered on his mind because it was unusual.

Bastian Christou looked up with a slight smile and inexplicably that smile of his suddenly chilled Emmie to her bone marrow. ‘But that’s not quite true, is it?’

Frozen there in front of his desk, Emmie blinked rapidly, unnerved by the ESP promptings that were warning her of a threat when there was no possible threat that she could see. ‘Sorry?’ she questioned uncertainly, having lost the thread of the conversation.

‘It’s untrue that you don’t use the name Emerald,’ Bastian declared, swivelling his laptop round for her to view what was on the screen.

Emmie’s soft mouth fell wide when she saw the picture he was referring to, shock and disbelief vibrating through her from head to toe because she could not imagine how a personal photograph of hers could have ended up on the Internet for anyone to see. It had been taken at her graduation party on one of the very rare occasions when she dressed up and threw caution to the wind and the photo was still in her digital camera…or at least she had thought it was. ‘What’s this? Where did you find that photo?’ she gasped strickenly.

‘On the website belonging to the Exclusive Companions escort agency,’ Bastian confided, noting that she had turned as white as a sheet at his admission and experiencing an entirely unexpected pang of conscience because she contrived to appear genuinely shattered by his discovery. Of course, he reasoned, that merely proved that she had the useful skill of being a good actress in a challenging situation.

‘Exclusive C-Companions?’ Emmie stammered, for it was her mother’s business and she knew that her photograph could not have been uploaded to that website without her mother’s involvement. She was absolutely appalled and stared fixedly at that colourful image with a sinking heart. How on earth could Odette do that to her? Her mother knew she wanted no involvement with her business. ‘How did you find this?’

‘ Not because I was visiting the website,’ Bastian asserted with dry emphasis. ‘Someone else who works here drew it to my attention.’

Nausea curled in her sensitive tummy. Who else knew? How many people? Inwardly she cringed in embarrassment. Who else was now convinced that she worked as an escort outside office hours? My goodness, was everyone she worked with talking about this behind her back? Humiliation clawed at her and she cursed the day she had moved in with her mother. What on earth was her picture doing on the website when she didn’t work as an escort? But who on earth would ever believe that now?

‘It is you, isn’t it?’ Bastian Christou pressed.

In silence, Emmie gritted her teeth and nodded agreement, unable to see how she could lie on that score. ‘But it’s not what you think—’

‘Allow me to know what to think,’ Bastian Christou murmured, smooth as glass.

‘It’s none of your business!’ Emmie told him, her mortification yielding to a sudden rush of resentment.

‘I’m afraid it is my business,’ Bastian countered levelly. ‘Your employment contract with this company states that you’re not allowed to do anything which might bring the company into disrepute and I’m afraid that advertising yourself on the Internet as an escort would fall within that category.’

Emmie lost colour. She could not believe that a foolish action of her mother’s might have put her job at risk, but she could also understand that it was an association that any employer might consider distasteful and suspect. ‘I’ll deal with it,’ she said flatly, her full lips compressing with determination.

‘How will you deal with it?’ Bastian asked, glittering dark eyes pinned to her with growing curiosity, his attention lingering on that soft full mouth. He wanted to rip off the spectacles and tug her hair out of that ugly ponytail and see her beauty as nature had intended it to be seen: that mane of golden hair, clear, flawless skin and glorious eyes. When most women went to great lengths to look the best they could, why the hell did she hide her beauty as though it were something to be ashamed of? And then unveil that beauty to be an escort? Had she been afraid from the start that someone in the office might recognise that photo and realise she was leading a double life? It was the only explanation he could see that made sense of such a disguise.

‘I’ll have the photo taken down from the website. It shouldn’t be there,’ she declared defensively. ‘I don’t actually work as an escort—’

‘But clearly you have a connection to the agency,’ Bastian pointed out, amused by her vehemence, her eagerness to persuade him that he had somehow misunderstood. She had little hope of getting far with that objective when he had so recently booked and paid for her services, he conceded grimly.

Emmie squirmed, determined not to admit the degrading truth that her connection to the escort agency was through her mother. ‘I promise you that I’ll deal with it and that photo will be taken down as soon as I can get it organised.’

‘If you’re tied into an employment contract with the agency it won’t be that simple a matter,’ Bastian warned her and he pushed a business card across the desk towards her. ‘Feel free to contact this lawyer if you need advice or assistance on that score.’

‘There is no contract. I told you…I don’t work as an escort,’ Emmie repeated doggedly, her colour high because she knew he didn’t believe her and she didn’t really blame him for that when her photo was on the website for all to see. She was mortified by the entire conversation but surprised that he was offering her a legal contact who could help her cut ties that didn’t actually exist. Fortunately, the only tie Emmie had to Exclusive Companions was her blood tie to her manipulative mother.