The Pregnancy Test (NY Girlfriends #1)(4)
Author: Erin McCarthy

She really didn’t think that was the confident side Caroline wanted her to be projecting.

Chapter 2

Damien Sharpton usually knew what to do in any given situation.

But he didn’t know what the hell to do about the woman bent completely over in the elevator, ass up, head down.

His first urge was to step out in the hallway and let the door close on her.

Despite what people said about him, however, he wasn’t quite that heartless.

He was impatient. Calculating. Aggressive. Consumed by his work and utterly devoid of a personal life.

He was okay with all of that. Yet regardless of the past three years, and everything he’d been through, he wasn’t inhumane.

So he hovered, holding the doors open, and wondered what exactly he was supposed to do now.

"Do you want me to call someone?" He reached for his cell phone, pleased that he’d thought to foist her off on someone else. Let one of the executive assistants deal with her, until her husband or boyfriend or friend came and retrieved her. Not his assistant, since he didn’t have one at present.

That dippy little girl Lanie he’d hired out of total desperation had not worked out at all. Even the most simplistic of tasks like using the copier had been a struggle for her, and when he’d pointed out ways to increase her efficiency, stu had burst into tears on him.

But he could call Jim’s assistant, Terri. She was very ma ternal and sweet and would know what to do with a poten tial vomit situation.

"No, no, I’m fine, really. I have to get to this interview, really need this job for the health insurance."

Obviously, since she was sick as a dog. Damien tried tc remember what she looked like when her light brown hail wasn’t covering her face, but he hadn’t really noticed hei when he’d stepped on the elevator. He had been thinking about his nine-o’clock conference call with the Atlanta team and hoping that his eight-o’clock interview would re suit in an assistant who could actually use Instant Messaging without inserting giggling smiley faces every other word.

Lanie had been fond of those.

Damien cleared his throat and flipped open his phone trying to remember Terri’s extension.

"Can you hand me your coffee cup?"

"For what?" But he was already leaning down and stick ing his coffee cup under her hair in the direction of hei hand, figuring it wouldn’t be wise to upset her. The dooi tried to close again, but he held it with his foot and hip hoping it wasn’t creasing his suit.

"I’m going to stand up, but I need something to catch it just in case I get sick."

Oh, good God. He was sorry he’d asked. And while he’c gotten a grande, he didn’t think the cup was that big. And i was still half full.

A little fist of nausea curled in his own stomach, and ht lifted his eyes up from her head to distract himself. Her sui jacket had slid down toward her neck, given the pull o gravity, and he could see her bare back above her waistline Her flesh was smooth, slightly pink, her waist tapering it above her skirt, in a way that was very…

Damn.

Damien nearly thunked himself on the forehead. What the hell was he doing?

In three years, he’d never once felt the stirrings of attraction for a woman, and now he suddenly found a woman’s bare back sexy. A faceless, flu-striken woman. It was ludicrous.

"Thanks. I really appreciate this. The job I’m interviewing for, I’ve heard the boss is a complete and total ogre. He’s scared off all his other assistants and is completely unreasonable. I don’t mind, because well, I need the job, but I don’t want to cancel last minute with someone like that. So I’ve got to go, hell or high water."

She stood up with a shaky surge, and as her eyes locked with his, Damien realized he was looking at his eight A.M. interview appointment.

He was the ogre.

She wanted to be his assistant.

And she was gorgeous.

With a heart-shaped face, chin-length hair that tumbled in soft waves, bangs sticking up a little from her previous position. Her brown eyes were huge, warm, vulnerable. Her cheekbones were high, her lips bowed, her skin a flushed pink and her breath rushing in and out on shaky little bursts. There were slight dark circles under her eyes, and her cheeks were a bit hollow, like she’d lost weight from the illness she was battling.

Germs were probably leaping off her and onto him even as he stood there, but he didn’t retreat into the hallway. In fact, he let go of the door and stepped forward. Found himself bending over to pick up her bag and her shoes.

Shoving them in her hands. "Here," he said gruffly, as the elevator closed and started to ascend.

"Thanks." She brushed her bangs back, making them stick up even more. Then she passed the coffee to him and kicked the brown Eskimo-looking boot off her foot. "You can have your coffee back. I don’t think I need it after all."

Damien took the cup and tried not to curl his lip in distaste. He’d never look at a grande coffee from the cafe downstairs in quite the same way. Nor could he believe that somehow this woman had heard he was difficult, unreasonable, an ogre, before she’d even been hired.

When she bent partially to put on her black dress shoe, she made a small sound of distress. Afraid he’d be stuck on the elevator indefinitely, Damien grabbed her arm and balanced her before she wound up on the floor or worse. He wasn’t sure his dry cleaner could remove vomit.

"I’m okay, I’m okay."

He admired her tenacity. While it would have been simpler and probably smarter for her to just reschedule the interview, she had toughed it out. Probably assuming that he would dismiss her as irresponsible for canceling and that he wouldn’t be willing to give her a shot.

Not that he would do that. He didn’t think. He mentally went through his tight calendar. He wasn’t the most patient of guys, and he’d had it with incompetent and lazy assistants. Being totally honest, he probably wouldn’t have rescheduled with her, assuming she wasn’t serious about the job.

Which annoyed him that his ogre reputation might actually have some minor basis in fact.

The elevator opened on twenty-four, and an older man got on.

Reaching over, Damien punched the eighteenth floor. No sense in riding this thing all the way to the ground floor again.

Then he watched the woman tuck her boots in her bag. He narrowed his eyes. He fought irritation. Attraction. Admiration.

Time to clear his morning. "Mandy Keeling?"

She looked up in surprise. "Yes, how did you…" Horror descended on her face, her fingers rising to clutch at her throat. "Oh, no. No, no, no, you can’t be…"