Diana Palmer - Any Man Of Mine

Nicholas. She closed her eyes and smiled. How long ago had it been when Nicholas Coleman had offered her the chance to work as an assistant designer in his textile empire? It was well over six years ago.

She’d been utterly green at twenty-one. Fresh out of fashion design school in Atlanta and afraid of the big, dark man behind the desk of Coleman Textiles in his Atlanta skyscraper.

It had taken her a week to get up enough nerve to approach him, but she’d been told that he was receptive to new talent, and that he was a sucker for stray animals and stray people.

Even now she could remember how frightened she’d been, looking across the massive desk at that broad leonine face that looked as if it had never smiled.

“Well, show me what you can do, honey,” he’d dared with a cynical smile. “I don’t bite.”

She’d spread her drawings out on the glass surface of the cluttered desk, her hands trembling, and watched for his reaction. But nothing had shown in his dark face, nor in his dark brown, deep-set eyes. He’d nodded, but that was all. Then he’d leaned back in his swivel chair and stared at her.

“Training?” he’d shot at her.

“The—the fashion design school, here in town,” she’d managed to get out. “I...that is, I worked on the third shift at the cotton mill to pay my way through. My father works for a textile mill back home—”

“Where is back home?” he interrupted.

“Ashton,” she replied.

He nodded, and waited for her to continue, giving every impression of being interested in her muddled speech.

“So I know a little about it,” she murmured. “And I’ve always wanted to design things. Oh, Mr. Coleman, I know I can do it if someone will just give me the chance. I know I can.” Her eyes lit up and she put her whole heart and all her youthful enthusiasm into her words. “I realize there’s a lot of competition for design jobs, but if you’ll give me a chance, I promise I won’t let you down. I’ll design the sharpest clothes for the lowest cost you’ve ever seen. I’ll work weekends and holidays, I’ll—”

“One month,” he said, cutting into her sentence.

He leaned forward and pinned her with his level gaze. “That’s how much time you’ve got to prove to me that you can stand the pace.” He threw out a salary that staggered her, and then dismissed her with a curt gesture and went back to his paperwork.

He’d been married then, but his wife of ten years had died shortly thereafter of a massive heart attack. Rumors had flown all over the main plant, where Keena worked, but she ignored them. She didn’t believe that an argument had provoked the heart attack, and she told one of the women so. Mr. Coleman, she assured her tersely, wasn’t that kind of man. He had too much compassion and, besides, why would he keep a picture of his wife on his desk if he didn’t love her?

Somehow the innocent little speech had gotten back to him and the next week, he’d sought her out in the canteen on the pretense of asking how everything was going.

“I’m well on my way to making you fabulously wealthy,” she assured him with an impish grin as she held her plastic coffee cup between her hands.

“I’m already fabulously wealthy,” he replied.

She sighed. “In that case, you’re in a lot of trouble.”

He’d smiled at that—the first time she’d seen him smile since his wife’s death. The late Mrs. Coleman had been a beauty—blond and delicate, a perfect foil for his size and darkness. Since her death he’d been strangely lost, and his temper had become legendary. He spent more time at the plant than at his office, and threw himself into the accumulation of other plants to complement it. His holdings and his wealth had mushroomed in the months between, and the pressure was telling on him. His hair was growing silver at the temples; his eyes were boasting dark shadows. His tireless business dealings were becoming the talk of the plant. Mr. Coleman was out to become a billionaire, some said. Mr. Coleman was after a business rival, others said. Mr. Coleman was going to make his empire the biggest in America, if he lived, others commented. But only Keena seemed to see through the relentless businessman to the lonely, grief-stricken man underneath. The other employees might think Mr. Coleman was indestructible, but Keena was certain that he wasn’t. She would run into him occasionally in the elevator or in the cafeteria. She recalled one time in particular when his eyes had seemed to seek her out. With his coffee in hand, he strolled over to her table and sat down beside Keena and her friend Margaret as naturally and easily as if the three met for a coffee break every day.

“How’s it going, Miss Future Famous Designer?” he asked Keena with an amused glance.

Keena had laughed and given him a flip reply, something about an interview in Women’s Wear Daily. Hadn’t he seen it? Margaret finished her coffee and excused herself quickly.

“Did I say something I shouldn’t have?” Nicholas asked, staring after the young woman.

“The company brass makes most employees want to run for cover,” Keena explained in a dry tone.

“You aren’t running,” he observed.

“Ah, yes,” she agreed. “But then, I’ve never had much sense.”

He chuckled into his coffee, taking a long sip of it. “The patternmakers sing your praises, by the way. They told me your specs were the first they’d had in five years that were written in English.”

“High praise, indeed, and I hope I’m going to get a ten thousand dollar a year raise as an inducement to keep them in a good mood?” She grinned.

“Cheeky, aren’t you?” he asked with narrowed eyes.

“It’s my dimple,” she replied in all seriousness.

He shook his head in mock despair. “Incorrigible.”

She looked at him—so businesslike and somber in the vested gray business suit that strained against his massive, muscular frame—and dropped her eyes almost at once.

After that day he’d made a point of having coffee with her once in a while. Infrequently, he’d invited her out for a meal, and they’d talk a great deal. She’d asked him once if he had any family, and he’d replied stiffly that what there was of it wasn’t to his liking.

“It still hurts, doesn’t it?” she had asked quietly then.

He stared at her, his face closed up. “I beg your pardon?”

She met his eyes with compassion and utter fearlessness. “You miss her.”

He seemed to see right into her mind in the long minute that followed, and the hauteur slowly drained out of him.

“I miss her like hell,” he admitted finally and with a faint, fleeting smile. “She was the loveliest creature I ever knew, inside and out. Generous to a fault, shy.” He sighed heavily, his face darkening. “Some women can tear a man down with every word. But Misty made me feel every inch a man every time she looked at me. We married because it was necessary to keep the businesses in the family. But we grew to love each other desperately.” He glanced at her. “Yes, I miss her.”

She smiled at him. “You were lucky.”

He scowled. “Lucky?”

“Some people go through life without ever touching or being touched emotionally by another human being. To love and be loved in return must be magic,” she finished gently. “And you had that for ten years.”

His eyes had searched hers before they fell. “I never thought of it that way,” he said simply.

“Shouldn’t you?” Her voice had been gentle and low. And while he was still thinking about it, she changed the subject completely, telling him about some ridiculous mix-up that had occurred in the cutting room that afternoon.

It was sad that he and Misty hadn’t been able to have children, she had always thought. They would have made him less lonely. But she could see that he seemed to find solace in her company, and they had worlds of things in common, from a mutual love of ballet and the theater to classical music and art. She found in him a mentor as much as a friend, a tutor and a protector. Nicholas never made a pass at her himself and was fiercely protective. He scrutinized the few suitors she had over the years and gave her his advice, welcome or not, on the men she went out with. If she had to work late, he escorted her home himself. And when he felt that she was ready, he’d found her a job as an apprentice designer in one of New York’s grandest fashion houses. He’d encouraged her, pushed her, bullied and chided her, until she climbed straight to the top, which was quite a climb for the only child of a poor, widowed textile worker in the small Georgia town of Ashton. She didn’t like to remember her childhood at all. In fact, Nicholas was the only person she’d ever told about it. But then, Nicholas was like no one else. In a real sense he was the only true friend she’d ever had since she left Ashton. And shortly after she’d come to New York, she was relieved to know that Nicholas maintained an apartment in the city.