Passion from the Past Page 3

  ‘But I already work for the chairman of the company,’ Laura sighed. ‘I can’t get any higher than that.’

  ‘You’re only his junior secretary, dear,’ her mother said dismissively. ‘And besides, you said this Gideon Maitland is going to be made chairman next year when James Courtney steps down.’

  ‘Steps down’ didn’t quite apply to the way Laura expected James Courtney to relinquish his control of Courtneys. She had no doubt that he would be about for years to come, that although he might be willing to appear to give control to his son-in-law that there would one day be quite a power struggle between the two men. James Courtney would still be capable of running the firm when he was eighty, she had no doubt of that.

  ‘He is,’ she confirmed her mother’s statement. ‘But filling in for his secretary when she’s off sick isn’t exactly what I’d planned for my future.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, dear!’ Her mother’s tone was impatient, the red of Laura’s hair a deep chestnut on the older woman, her face and figure still youthfully attractive. ‘When he’s made chairman, if you’ve made enough of an impression on him, then he may just make you his personal secretary.’

  Laura knew her mother was ambitious for her, in fact it had been her mother’s promptings that had made her apply for the senior position she already had at Courtneys, but surely even she couldn’t imagine she could be made personal secretary to the chairman of a company as big as Courtneys at the age of twenty, as she would be next year? It appeared she could.

  ‘There are plenty of other girls more qualified for the position,’ she pointed out to her mother. ‘The girl I’m standing in for on Monday, for one.’

  ‘I’ve no doubt she is.’ Her mother’s eyebrows rose. ‘But you’ll just have to make yourself even more—indispensable to him, won’t you?’

  Laura frowned, looking at her mother disbelievingly. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Oh, don’t be naïve, Laura!’ Her mother stood up to pace the room impatiently. ‘No girl gets anywhere these days on qualifications alone, there are just too many talented women. I’ve no doubt Gideon Maitland’s present secretary makes more than her secretarial attributes available to him.’

  ‘Mother!’ Laura gasped her indignation on the other girl’s behalf. ‘Diane Holland is happily married.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Mother, really!’ And Laura left the room in disgust, going upstairs to her bedroom before she lost her temper.

  Where her mother got these ridiculous ideas from she just didn’t know, but this one about Gideon Maitland was the most ridiculous yet. Her mother couldn’t really imagine she would enter into an affair with a man just to get on in her career. No woman had to do that nowadays. It was the time of equality, wasn’t it?

  Besides which, she had no reason to suppose Gideon Maitland had even realised she was female, let alone that he was attracted to her. Goodness, a man like that, with his looks and money, could take his pick of any woman in the world. Hadn’t he chosen the beautiful and famous Petra Wilde to be his girl-friend?—and they didn’t come any more exclusively beautiful than that. Gideon Maitland had no need to indulge in needless affairs with his secretary. Why cause complications like that in his office when he had the lovely Petra Wilde in his life—in his bed?

  Nevertheless, her mother had put the thought in her mind, and consequently she felt awkward about facing Gideon Maitland on Monday morning. Not that he could possibly know about the embarrassing suggestion her mother had made, but she knew, and she could hardly bear to face him.

  She arrived early on Monday morning, her intention being to explain the work of the past week to Dorothy before she had to go down the corridor to Gideon Maitland’s office. Dorothy always arrived at eight-thirty, so Laura had decided to do the same this morning, spending the next half an hour going over every detail of the work she had done in the other woman’s absence.

  When she had finished she gave Dorothy a shy smile. ‘It’s good to have you back.’

  The other woman smiled, a woman in her mid-forties who had been with James Courtney for the last twenty years. It was rumoured that she had been in love with her boss years ago, but her sudden marriage at the age of forty seemed to have put an end to that. But her loyalty to James Courtney remained constant even during his cruellest of moods—and he had plenty of those.

  ‘Mr Courtney doesn’t like his routine disturbed,’ Dorothy excused, as if guessing that he had been unbearable to work for the last few days. ‘You’ll find Mr Maitland a lot less—strict about the rules.’

  In other words he wasn’t such a swine to work for! Even guessing how impossible their bad-tempered boss had been the last few days Dorothy could still defend him. And no doubt his mood would mellow now that his efficient, almost mind-reading secretary was back.

  Laura stood up reluctantly. ‘I suppose I’d better go along to Mr Maitland’s office now, it’s almost nine.’

  Dorothy was sorting through the pile of mail on her desk, already back in command. ‘Good luck, dear,’ she said absently. ‘And if you run into any problems don’t hesitate to call me for help, although you should find the work more or less the same as here.’

  ‘I hope so,’ Laura said fervently.

  She had no choice but to go to Gideon Maitland’s office now, remembering his comment about her not being late.

  The door to the inner office was closed, so she assumed he was already in there. Now what did she do? His secretary’s desk seemed to be clear of all visible work, but she couldn’t just sit here doing nothing.

  ‘Good morning.’

  She turned with a start, blushing as she saw Gideon Maitland standing casually in the doorway of his office. ‘Good morning—er, sir,’ she returned awkwardly.

  He straightened, very dark and attractive in a navy blue three-piece suit, the waistcoat fitted against his taut stomach. Most men of his age, seated behind a desk all day, would have run to fat by now, but this man obviously had some way of keeping fit. The memory of Petra Wilde and his relationship with her instantly flashed into Laura’s mind, and she blushed at her own awareness of this man’s attraction. He made her quiver all over just to look at him, and how she was going to work with him she had no idea.

  ‘Call me Gideon,’ he invited smoothly.

  ‘Oh no,’ she shook her head, wishing she had more confidence in her appearance. Once again she was dressed to look cool and efficient, the brown tailored suit and cream blouse were smart if not exactly attractive. ‘I—I couldn’t.’

  ‘Of course you could,’ he insisted briskly. ‘I have every intention of calling you Laura.’

  She flushed with the pleasure of him actually being aware of her first name. ‘That’s different.’

  His mouth twisted. ‘Because I’m the boss and you’re the secretary?’

  ‘Well, I—Yes.’ She looked down at her hands.

  Gideon looked at her steadily, his piercing grey eyes taking in everything about her. ‘We may not always have just a business relationship,’ he drawled.

  Laura swallowed hard, looking at him with wide eyes. Goodness, her mother couldn’t be right, could she? This man wouldn’t expect more than secretarial duties from her, would he? Not that she wasn’t attracted to him, but she didn’t approve of those type of relationships. Besides, he had Petra Wilde, hadn’t he? No, he must just mean that perhaps they could become friends. She would like that.

  ‘What would you like me to do, Mr Maitland—er—Gideon?’ It didn’t feel right calling him that, and she doubted she would be able to do it again.

  The morning rushed by in a haze of work. Gideon Maitland was as dynamic as James Courtney, although he wasn’t so aggressive to the people he worked with, making sure she went to lunch even though they were really busy. Laura enjoyed working with him, and found him decisive and accurate, quick to put people down if they made a mistake but equally quick to give praise if praise were due.

  For all the wall of harshness that surrounded him he was popula
r with the other staff, male and female alike, and most of them could hardly wait for the time he took over as chairman.

  ‘I wouldn’t mind being his secretary,’ one of the girls at Laura’s table remarked as she ate her lunch in the staff canteen. Gideon Maitland was up in the executives’ dining-room—and not, Laura felt sure, eating a ham salad either.

  Laura shrugged. ‘He’s very nice to work for.’ She wasn’t going to get into a discussion about him, feeling a loyalty towards him after only one morning of working for him.

  ‘Who wants to work?’ the other girl laughed; she was secretary to one of the department managers.

  Laura blushed. ‘Mr Maitland works very hard,’ she defended, and gulped down her coffee, anxious to leave.

  ‘He plays very hard too,’ Susan grinned. ‘There’s a photograph of him in my magazine this week,’ she bent to take it out of her handbag. ‘He’s with Petra Wilde.’ She found the appropriate page and spread the magazine out in front of Laura.

  Laura didn’t want to look, hadn’t wanted to see how well Gideon and the beautiful actress looked together. And they did look good, as she had known they would. Petra Wilde was almost as tall as her escort, her flaming red dress daring in the extreme as the two of them attended the premiere of the actress’s latest film. Gideon Maitland was laughing down at the other woman, looking happy and relaxed, completely unlike the harsh man he was during working hours. He looked so tall and distinguished, the photograph showing the wings of grey at his temples, his magnificent physique shown to full advantage in the black evening suit and snowy white shirt.

  No wonder Petra Wilde gazed up at him so adoringly, her blue eyes sparkling with some secret message. The couple’s whole relationship looked intimate, Gideon’s arm firmly about the actress’s waist as he held her at his side.

  ‘Very nice,’ Laura pushed the magazine back across the table to Susan. ‘It’s a very good photograph,’ she added as she saw the other girl’s disappointed expression at her reaction.

  ‘You don’t seem very interested, I must say,’ Susan said in a disgruntled voice.

  If the other girl knew what a wrench the photograph gave to her heart she wouldn’t say that. Laura had expected to have her romantic illusions about Gideon destroyed once she began working for him, had thought the familiarity would show her how silly her infatuation was, but if anything she had fallen more under his spell, gazing at him longingly when he wasn’t looking at her.

  ‘I have to get back.’ She stood up, knowing that she still had twenty minutes of her lunch-break left, but not prepared to sit and answer questions about Gideon for all that time.

  As she had thought, her new boss was still out at lunch when she got back, but she could use this time to finish her typing.

  ‘That’s what I like to see.’

  She looked up to see Nigel Jennings, the Personnel Manager for the company, standing in the open doorway. She returned his smile as he came over to her desk. ‘What’s that?’ she asked.

  ‘Well, I must have made the right decision when I employed you,’ he grinned, sitting on the edge of her desk. ‘Otherwise you wouldn’t be working for Gideon.’

  ‘It’s only temporary.’

  He nodded; he was a man of about thirty, with boyishly blond good looks. He looked too young to carry the responsibilities he did, and yet Laura knew James Courtney valued his work, that he trusted his judgement implicitly. The only time he seemed to have doubted his judgement had been in Nigel’s employment of her!

  ‘Diane’s off with ‘flu.’ He picked up the paperweight from the desk. ‘But then so is almost everyone else.’ He grimaced. ‘That’s why I’m here to see Gideon, actually. It’s the firm’s annual dinner-dance next week, and if half the company isn’t going to be able to go it might be better if we just cancelled it.’

  ‘I suppose so.’ Laura had forgotten all about the dinner-dance, and in any case had not intended going even if she did manage to evade catching this ‘flu bug that was running rife in the company.

  Nigel quirked an eyebrow at her. ‘I suppose you’re bringing your boy-friend along?’

  ‘Well, actually—’

  ‘You aren’t?’ he cut in eagerly.

  Laura viewed him with something like dismay, guessing that his reaction when she told him she wasn’t thinking of going would be to invite her to go with him. Not that she didn’t like him, on the few occasions when they had spoken together she had found him a very agreeable companion. But she knew from experience what these company dinners were like, knew the romantic speculation that would go on for days afterwards if two employees spent any time together at all.

  ‘I’m not going. You see,’ she added firmly as he made to protest, ‘I don’t like to leave my mother alone in the evenings. She’s a widow, and—’

  ‘Surely one night isn’t going to hurt,’ Nigel protested, his open features clearly showing his disappointment. ‘It isn’t as if it happens every night of the week. And I’d like you to come. Laura—’

  ‘Hello, Nigel.’ Gideon Maitland had miraculously appeared in the office, not that he could possibly know the embarrassment he was saving her if she had had to turn down Nigel’s invitation. Grey eyes flickered coldly, over them both, and Nigel slowly stood up. ‘Anything I can do for you?’ Gideon asked politely enough. ‘Or did you just come to see my secretary?’ His voice hardened perceptively.

  The other man flushed, obviously as unnerved by this tall imposing man as everyone else seemed to be. ‘I came to see you, actually, Gideon.’ He had obviously recovered his composure. ‘But—’

  ‘But while you were here you thought you’d chat up my secretary,’ Gideon drawled.

  ‘I—Well—’

  ‘Come through to my office,’ Gideon instructed briskly. ‘Are you back from lunch, Laura?’

  ‘Er—yes, sir.’

  He nodded, his face darkening at her formal way of addressing him. Laura waited until the two men had gone through to the other office before restarting her typing. It felt strange to hear Gideon keep referring to her as ‘his secretary’ when all she was doing was filling in for a few days. As soon as Diane was back she would return to James Courtney’s tyranny.

  Gideon had been angry about her talking to Nigel, and he had every right to be. She might still have been on her lunch-break at the time, but the conversation had taken place in the office, a social conversation that he had every right to object to.

  Nigel came out of the office about ten minutes later. ‘About next week, Laura—’

  ‘Laura, could you come in here, please,’ Gideon requested curtly from behind him. ‘Was there anything else, Nigel?’ he looked calmly at the other man.

  Nigel shrugged his defeat in the face of a determination stronger than his own. ‘No, nothing. Perhaps I’ll see you for lunch tomorrow, Laura?’

  ‘I—Perhaps.’ She was already gathering up her short-hand pad and pencil, one look at Gideon’s face telling her that he wasn’t in a mood to be kept waiting.

  She walked proudly past Gideon as he pointedly held the door open to his office, and sat down in the chair opposite his, her pencil poised expectantly, looking up uncertainly as he seemed in no hurry to begin dictation.

  ‘Are you in the habit of spending time with Nigel Jennings?’ he asked suddenly.

  Laura blinked dazedly at the unexpectedness of such a question, her notepad slowly lowering to her knees. ‘I beg your pardon?’ she frowned.

  ‘Out of working hours you’re free to see who you want,’ he continued harshly. ‘But while you’re working for me I would prefer it if you saw your boy-friend away from my office.’

  ‘Nigel—I mean, Mr Jennings isn’t my boy-friend!’ she gasped indignantly.

  Gideon raised dark eyebrows. ‘He isn’t?’

  ‘No. He came up here to see you, not me.’

  ‘I see. Do you have a boy-friend?’

  ‘Why?’ she asked the question without thinking, blushing at the look of irritation that passed across
his handsome face. ‘I mean—’

  ‘You mean why do I want to know about your personal life,’ he drawled, relaxing back in his chair. He shrugged. ‘I like to know something about the people who work with me.’

  Of course—how stupid of her to think his interest was personal. A lot of the work he gave her was confidential, he couldn’t just reveal those sort of things to anyone. Although James Courtney had never expressed an interest in her private life.

  She shrugged. After all, what harm could it do? ‘No, I don’t have a boy-friend.’

  He raised surprised eyebrows. ‘You’re very attractive.’

  With her hair free about her shoulders, and younger, attractive clothing, she was perhaps passable, but she certainly wasn’t ‘very attractive’.

  ‘When you look the nineteen you are,’ he seemed to guess her thoughts. ‘And don’t try to look and act ten years older.’

  Colour flooded Laura’s cheeks. ‘When did you—I’ve never—When did you see me looking nineteen?’ she asked almost defensively.

  He shrugged, a pen held loosely between his long fingers as he played with it idly. Laura found her gaze mesmerised by the way he seemed to almost caress the cold metal, blushing even more as she looked up to find him following her line of vision, his mouth twisting mockingly.

  ‘I can’t remember,’ he dismissed easily. ‘Somewhere.’

  She couldn’t imagine where, she never appeared anything but the more mature person she was at work. Still, Gideon seemed very certain, and he wasn’t a man who would very often be wrong.

  ‘Your mother is a widow, I believe.’ He seemed in no hurry to begin dictation; he was completely relaxed, his grey eyes narrowed.

  ‘Yes.’ Laura frowned her puzzlement, once again wondering why he needed to know about her private life.

  ‘And you have a brother.’

  ‘Yes,’ she nodded. ‘He lives in America now.’

  ‘I didn’t realise that. He used to work for us, didn’t he?’

  ‘Yes,’ she acknowledged eagerly. ‘It was because he liked working here so much that I—But you don’t want to hear about that.’ She bit her lip.