Married to His Business (Millionaire of the Month #5)(28)
Author: Elizabeth Bevarly

"I sort of quit. Effective immediately."

He was wrong. That wasn’t promising. It was perfect.

Before he could say anything more, she hurried on, "But I sort of didn’t take into consideration until too late the fact that, by quitting, I was also ending any reason for Stephen to pay my hotel bill. In the time it took me to walk from the café where we had our morning meeting back to my room, the lock had already been changed on my door. The only reason I was able to get my stuff out was because housekeeping showed up, and the housekeeper was nice enough to let me change my clothes and pack while she was in there cleaning."

Thank God for small favors, Matthias thought. Inescapably, his gaze had dropped to her midsection again when he’d noticed—how could he miss it?—that as Kendall had

spoken, she had used a lot of hand gestures, and the hem of her little T-shirt rose and fell with every one, once even high enough to allow him a peek at a truly spectacular navel. So spectacular, in fact, that he enjoyed a quick impression of dragging a line of openmouthed kisses across her flat abdomen before dipping his tongue into the elegant little cleft for a taste….

Until he remembered it was Kendall’s navel he was tasting in his fantasy. Kendall, he reminded himself emphatically. This was Kendall he was thinking about, for God’s sake. Kendall’s midsection. And Kendall’s navel. All of them were strictly off-limits because. Because. Because.

Well, because she was Kendall, Matthias told himself. That was why. A trusted employee. A trusted employee he didn’t want to compromise with some kind of messy workplace involvement. A trusted employee with an excellent work record. A trusted employee with strong business ethics and sound professional judgment.

A trusted employee with silky dark blond hair that was tumbling free around her shoulders in a way that made him want to reach out and touch it. A trusted employee with enormous green eyes a man could drown in. A trusted employee with a luscious navel he really, really wanted to taste.

"So if the offer of that new position is still open," his luscious, tasty, trusted employee said now, "I’d like to come back to work for you."

The word that should have registered most in that sentence was work. But Matthias’s brain had gotten so caught up on position that it never quite made the leap to work. And the position that came to mind just then, although it definitely involved Kendall, had absolutely nothing to do

with work. Well, okay, maybe there would have to be a little work involved—it was kind of an unusual position—but that work would have definitely been a labor of lo—

Lust, he hastily corrected himself. A labor of lust.

"Matthias?"

His name, spoken in her voice, a voice so rife with concern, made him push the thoughts out of his head completely. "What?" he asked.

She eyed him curiously. "Is everything.okay?"

He nodded. "Yeah, fine," he said with some distraction. "I was reading when you rang the bell, and I guess my mind just hasn’t caught up with the rest of me."

Actually, that wasn’t true, he knew. His mind had not only caught up, it had raced right past him and was now in an entirely different time zone. The Navel Zone. Where time moved at a totally different pace than it did in Lake Tahoe.

"So is it okay if I crash here for a couple of days?" she asked again. "I had to change my flight back to San Francisco, and I couldn’t get one out until Monday. I tried to find a room at another hotel, but all the good ones are booked solid, and—"

"It’s fine, Kendall," he interrupted her. "Of course you can stay here. There’s plenty of room."

Though the minute he said that, somehow, for some reason, the huge lodge suddenly felt very crowded.

"Thanks," she said, breathing a sigh of unmistakable relief.

She bent to retrieve her bags, but Matthias intercepted her, scooping up all three before she had the chance. When he looked at her again, he could tell she was surprised by the gesture. Or maybe it was just that she was usually the one doing things for him, not the other way around.

It hit Matthias then, like a two-by-four to the back of

the head, how very true that was. When she was working for him, Kendall had done so many things for him to keep him on track. Granted, that was what he paid her for, but still. What had he ever done for her in return, other than pay her wages and benefits? Yeah, there had been the Godiva chocolates for her birthday every year and the gourmet food baskets every Christmas. But those had been things he’d had his secretary order for her—and he hadn’t even picked them out himself.

Then again, Kendall had never seemed to expect anything more, he told himself. Then again—again—that was no excuse for not showing his appreciation more often.

Note to self, Barton. Show Kendall a little appreciation this time around. As a reluctant afterthought, he made himself add, And appreciate something besides her navel.

It would be a tough job, but he was pretty sure he could do it.

She followed him up to the second floor where Matthias had a choice of guest rooms in which to house her. Not asking himself why he did it, he made his way immediately to one near the master bedroom, where he was sleeping himself. The room was furnished in varying shades of green and gold, the stout four-poster covered with a lightweight patchwork quilt, the hardwood floors broken up here and there with rag rugs. It was what Matthias had come to think of as the Rustic Room. Though it was every bit as luxurious as the rest of the house. The wide windows opened onto a thick patch of pine trees, beyond which was a spectacular view with a finger of lake on one side. At night, he thought, she could do what he’d been doing—lie in bed and listen to the wind gliding through the trees, and wait for the melancholy hoot-hoot-hoot of a solitary owl.

Hey, it wasn’t as if there was much else to do around the lodge at night. At least, there hadn’t been before.

"Why don’t you stay more than a couple of days?" he asked impulsively as he tossed Kendall’s bags onto the bed.

When he turned, he saw that she had stopped in the doorway, and she didn’t look as if she planned on coming in anytime soon.

"I mean, you quit OmniTech," he pointed out unnecessarily, "and I’m not going to be coming back to San Francisco for a few more weeks. I don’t expect you to report to the office before I get back myself. When was the last time you took a vacation?"

She threw him a funny look. "I just had one. Two weeks between leaving Barton Limited and going to work for OmniTech."

"Oh. Right. Well, what did you do during those two weeks?" he asked. "I bet you didn’t spend them out of town, did you?"