How To Be the Perfect Girlfriend. Heather Macallister
there wouldn’t be a whole lot left to say.
She heard him return the phone to its cradle and stepped into the doorway. “Mr. Northrup?”
He was standing behind his desk and there was a flash in his eyes. A flash, not a gleam, and it only meant he recognized her. “Sara.”
“I, uh…” Don’t say “uh.” “I—”
The phone buzzed. He frowned, let two buzzes go by then held up a finger indicating that Sara should stay.
She hated that, hated waiting around while someone was on the phone, pretending that she couldn’t hear, when of course she could. Even worse was when the conversation took an unexpected turn and she had to decide if she’d continue to pretend to be oblivious, or leave.
She really didn’t have much to say to Simon. She could just mouth her thank-you and make her escape except…
Except Simon had reached for the phone without breaking eye contact. How sexy was that? He didn’t mean for it to be sexy, she told herself. He couldn’t help it.
She swallowed.
Simon continued gazing at her as he spoke into the phone. If she had to describe his expression, she’d say it was watchful. The weird thing was that she didn’t feel at all uncomfortable or awkward about it.
So she gazed—it wasn’t really staring—back at him. Only at his eyes. Warm chocolate velvet eyes. Awareness crept over her. Awareness of him. Awareness of her. Awareness of what could be.
Awareness that she was probably making way too big a deal of this. But then people with big, fat crushes on other people did that, didn’t they?
“Yes,” he said. “Ask them to come up.” A pause, then, “How many?” He blinked for the first time. Just once. “I see. Yes, it’s all right.” He hung up the phone as smoothly as he’d answered it. “Sorry about that.”
“Oh, no. I know you’re busy. I just wanted to say thanks for not making a big deal out of finding the paper.” She thought about the way that sounded. “Not that it isn’t a big deal, and I know it. And I want you to know that I know it. Huge deal.” Babble, babble, babble. She should have quit after “thanks.”
He wasn’t saying anything. That was the problem. If he’d said, “It’s okay” or something she would have stopped babbling. But he merely watched her, his lips on the verge of a smile. On the verge. No smile. Important distinction.
Sara swallowed again, and attempted to end the conversation with some finesse. She linked her fingers together. “I wanted to reassure you that your trust in my competence has not been misplaced.”
There. That should be precise enough for him.
“Right.” He looked down at his desk. “Well, I’ll just delete this scathing memo to the head of Human Resources denouncing your…competence.”
He pressed a key on the open laptop on the desk in front of him and then closed it.
Sara forgot to breathe.
Simon smiled faintly. “I was joking.”
“Oh!” Sara giggled inanely. “I knew that!”
“No, you didn’t.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“A lot of people don’t get my jokes. I’ve always thought I was quite witty.” The line was delivered with the perfect deadpan expression. Despite his strait-laced reputation, the man clearly had a sense of humor. Don’t think about that.
Sara laughed, then wondered if she should have. “Maybe your jokes are just too subtle.”
“Chalk it up to my repressed boarding school up-bringing.”
“In England?”
“Yes.”
“You have a faint accent,” she told him so he wouldn’t think she’d been snooping in his file. And she hadn’t—not much.
“So does anyone who isn’t from Texas. I do try. I’ve been sprinkling y’alls and howdys throughout all my conversations.”
Sara tried to imagine a “y’all” passing Simon’s lips. Which made her look at his lips and the way they rested in that almost-smile position. His square jaw made him look strong, but the lips gave him a hint of vulnerability. All in all, it was a potent combination, especially considering his other body parts, which Sara had in no way forgotten.
He had a way of looking at her—maybe everyone—which made her believe that his entire attention was focused on her.
That was potent, too. It kept her focused on him and not on the fact that she should leave and he was being too polite to shoo her out.
Politeness was a lost art these days and highly underrated, Sara thought. Was it on her list of preferred male traits?
Voices erupted from the elevator. Female voices. Surely they were coming to meet with Simon. “Your visitors are here, so I’ll take off. Thanks again.”
He looked as though he was going to say something when Sara distinctly heard the sound of running. She was so surprised that she didn’t go anywhere. An instant later, two girls rounded the corner and headed straight for her. Sara stepped back into the office as the taller of the two reached out and slapped the door frame. “I won!”
“Kayla,” Simon said sternly.
Sara stood there, filled with an entirely inappropriate curiosity.
“This is a place of business,” he continued.
Kayla gave him a disgusted look. “Oh, chill.”
He took a deep breath that told Sara he’d taken many deep breaths in regard to Kayla. He turned to the dark-haired girl beside Kayla. “Howdy, Amber. How’re y’all doing?”
Sara tried to muffle her burst of surprised laughter and thought she was going to swallow her tongue. She made a noise that drew Kayla’s attention.
“Hey, is this your girlfriend?” Kayla eyed her with Hayden-like interest.
Sara judged her to be about twelve or thirteen, the age when girls had boys on the brain. Unlike Sara who had men on the brain.
“I work with Mr. Northrup,” she said.
“Mr. Northrup!” Kayla giggled and jostled a smiling Amber.
“Kayla, I told you girls not to run.” A woman appeared in the doorway of Simon’s office.
“Mom! It’s after hours. Nobody cares.”
Sara stared at Kayla’s mother. The woman was sophisticated perfection and moved with supreme self-confidence. It was as though Missy and Hayden had merged. Merged their ages, too. She looked to be in her early thirties.
And it wasn’t as though she was wearing a killer ladies-who-lunch suit, either. No, she had on slacks and pointy-toed shoes or boots, and a top with a matching sweater’s sleeves tied around her neck just so. A leather messenger bag—Prada? Kate Spade?—was slung over her shoulder.
Here, before her, was the perfect woman, and Sara realized just how far she was going to have to go to attract and hold the interest of Simon Northrup’s type.
Clearly, this was the woman and child that the rumor mill had been buzzing about. Well. Had she ever thought for one minute about flirting for real with Simon Northrup, this chance meeting put an end to that.
She was lucky. Oh, so lucky. She cringed at the thought of future humiliation averted.
There would be plenty of cringing and more humiliation at the complete and ruthless assessment of herself that would occur later, when she compared herself to the polished woman eyeing her with faintly dismissive curiosity. Oh, to master that look. Hayden no doubt had it in her arsenal. Sara would ask her to teach