SUSAN MEIER - Cinderella And The Ceo

But he dismissed that because he didn’t know for sure she had a problem. He was only guessing. And if she did, he didn’t know that he could fix it. Besides, it wasn’t his intention to get too involved with her, the town or the plant. He simply wanted to figure out why the audit was off by so much money and get back to the corporate office where he belonged because he didn’t have time for this. His stepfather, Roger Smith, planned to retire in two years, and in twenty-four short months, Deke would become responsible for the jobs of three thousand people and his family’s fortune. Having spent the past ten years traveling the country, playing minor-league baseball, only working for Graham Industries in the off-season, he wasn’t current with all the company’s projects. And he wanted to be current. Actually he wanted to be brilliant.

No, the truth was his family expected him to be brilliant. And he always did what his family expected. If he had been older than thirteen when his father died, he would have taken over his mother’s family’s company right then and there. But he had only been thirteen, his grandfather hired the man his mother eventually married, and Deke got a two-decade reprieve. He worked summers for his stepfather, got the right schooling and even worked in the off-seasons while he amused himself with his passion for baseball. Still, everybody knew he would drop that when the time came, and everybody knew he would do what was expected. Because he always did.

Which was exactly why he was here in Maryland.

“Mother, is dinner ready?” Laurel called, leading Deke into the kitchen.

“Ready to be put on the table when you’re ready to eat,” the woman who was obviously Laurel’s mother said. As tall as Laurel, with gray hair and the same fabulous green eyes, she stepped forward, wiping her hands in her apron as Deke and Laurel entered the kitchen.

“This is my mother, Judy Russell,” Laurel said, introducing him. “And this is Deke Bertrim. Like the other trainees, Deke’s agreed to stay with us while he’s at Graham Metals.”

“That’s nice,” Laurel’s mother said. “You two want to set the table?”

“Yes,” Deke agreed, jumping at the chance to help her because that was an easy way to pull his weight and maybe temper some of his uneasiness.

“That’s okay. You take a seat,” Laurel insisted when he followed her to a cupboard for dishes.

“But I want to help.”

“I’m fine,” Laurel said, pulling dishes from the shelf above her head.

He heard that damned quiver again, and felt the burden of guilt about not being honest with her when she seemed to have enough on her mind without his deception. Determined to silence the voice with good behavior and small favors, Deke reached for the stack of plates she held. Their hands inadvertently brushed, and an unexpected jolt of electricity sprinted up his arm. Confused, he stepped back. Seemingly unaffected, Laurel took the dishes through a swinging door that probably led to a dining room.

Deke leaned against the cabinet. Though he had relegated all his unusual feelings to guilt, there was no mistaking that jolt. It was sexual. Since he didn’t really know her, he recognized that little zap of electricity probably didn’t mean anything more than the fact that he was physically attracted to her. Which was fine. She was gorgeous. He’d already acknowledged that. He would probably worry more if he wasn’t attracted to her. But he was also a disciplined, intelligent man who didn’t do foolish things that would ruin his plans. A physical attraction could easily be ignored.

“If you’ll tell me where the glasses are, I’ll be glad to get them,” Deke said, addressing Laurel’s mother.

“Second door on the right,” Judy said as Laurel returned to the kitchen.

Though Deke was already at the cabinet, Laurel beat him to the handle on the cupboard door. Again when their fingers brushed, Deke felt a spiral of electricity curl up his arm, and again he stepped back.

It was odd that his attempt to rationalize this attraction hadn’t worked. Even his reminder that he wouldn’t let the attraction ruin his plan hadn’t stopped it or diminished it. Which wasn’t merely confusing, it was weird. Usually he had no trouble controlling these things.

He watched her move back and forth, to and from the dining room as she set the table. He noted the swing of her voluminous hair, then the swing of her hips as she walked. He recognized and acknowledged he found this woman very attractive, but he also told himself he could handle it.

He had to. He had to work with her and live with her for the next three months.

He narrowed his eyes and gave the problem his full attention until the answer came to him. Having an entire floor to himself, he could simply keep his distance, and that would work to a degree. But what he really needed was a diversion, something to entertain him in the downtime.

Now all he had to do was think of one.

As plates of food were being passed, Laurel surreptitiously studied the stranger she’d allowed into her home. She’d had her suspicions about him from the moment she’d read his thin personnel file and discovered he was older than the typical trainee the corporate office sent to Graham Metals. But that was just the tip of the iceberg.

Because Deke’s records didn’t give her a clue about his personality or his lifestyle, except that he had attended Harvard and he got his late start in business because of playing professional baseball, Laurel wasn’t going to offer him the opportunity to stay in her home. But Tom Baxter had insisted, assuring her that Deke Bertrim could be trusted. She’d reminded Tom that when she brought one of his trainees into her home, she literally was trusting him with her life and the lives of her daughters, but Tom stood fast. Deke Bertrim was not to be treated differently from the other trainees. Just because he was a little older—thirty-three—and a little better educated, that didn’t make him better than the other executive candidates or change Tom’s orders for putting him through his paces. Deke Bertrim needed this training the same as everybody else.

And he most definitely would not hurt her and her daughters, Tom assured her. Since Tom was a personal friend of Deke’s family, he could state with unequivocal certainty that Deke Bertrim was harmless.

Peeking across the dinner table at her boarder’s thick black hair, big blue eyes, broad shoulders, well-structured chest and beautiful biceps clearly outlined by his polo shirt, Laurel sincerely doubted the man was harmless. At least not to any red-blooded American female over the age of sixteen. But her daughters were four and eight, and she and her mother were clearly out of the market for romance, so she supposed the whole group of women was safe. Besides, she trusted Tom’s judgment. In the three years and six management trainees since she and Tom had started this procedure for indoctrinating his junior executives into the real world of manufacturing, he’d never steered her wrong. She and her family were thriving because of it.

“More soup, Mr. Bertrim?” Laurel’s mother asked, bringing Laurel back to the present and into the conversation around their dinner table.

“Thank you, Mrs. Russell, but I’m stuffed. That was wonderful.”

As usual, her mother beamed with pride. “My beef-barley soup and homemade bread always win raves at church functions.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Deke agreed, smiling.

The guy hadn’t wasted any time winning over her mother, Laurel thought, then glanced at her two little girls, Audra and Sophie. Staring at the new boarder with sparkles in her blue eyes, four-year-old Sophie was definitely enamored, which was okay since she was well below the age of trouble.