Project: Runaway Heiress by Heidi Betts Page A

had much more important things to focus on.
    One was pretending to be the perfect personal assistant for Nigel.
    The other was digging and snooping to see what else she could find concerning her stolen designs.
    She’d gone through the California Collection design printouts as much as she could last night before finally succumbing to exhaustion and crawling into bed, but she could barely remember a thing about them now. A second and possibly even third run-through was definitely called for. Of course, she couldn’t do that until tonight when she was home and alone again.
    A few yards down the hall, she heard the hum of the elevator and the whoosh of the doors as they opened and closed. Rushing to set aside her coffee, Lily took a deep breath, straightened in her chair, and started typing nothing in particular in an effort to look busy.
    * * *
    Nigel spotted Lillian the minute he stepped off the lift onto his office floor. If it was possible, she looked even more lovely today than she had last evening, and she’d looked quite stunning then.
    Perhaps because he’d always had a bit of a soft spot for the “sexy librarian” type. Her hair was pulled back in a sexy bun, bookish, dark-rimmed glasses resting on the bridge of her nose. Her jewelry was understated. She wore a red blouse that opened at the throat to reveal just enough pale flesh and shadowed cleavage to make a man’s libido sit up and take notice.
    She was seated behind her desk, so he couldn’t tell what she was wearing from the waist down. What he imagined, though, was tight and formfitting, showing off her legs and posterior to perfection. On top of that, he imagined her perching on the edge of the desk, legs crossed, shoe dangling from the toe of one foot, nibbling seductively on the end of her pen.
    Oh, yes—naughty librarian, indeed. Or more to the point, naughty secretary. Which was the thought that had plagued him all through last night.
    An affair with his secretary was not only bad form, but an extremely bad idea in general. As was allowing himself to be distracted by ungentlemanly and very un-bosslike thoughts about her.
    He’d spent an inordinate amount of time unable to sleep, kept awake by memories of their dinner together and that kiss at her door just before saying their good-nights.
    For a kiss akin to one he might give his mother or a beloved aunt, it had rocked him back on his heels and made him sorry he had to walk away.
    Worse, though, was that the thought of that one simple kiss on the cheek had snowballed into a thousand other thoughts and images he had no business thinking.
    Lillian perched on the edge of her desk, shoe dangling from her toes was only the first of many. The wee hours of the night had also been filled with more erotic fantasies.
    Pressing Lillian up against the door to her flat and kissing her for real. On the mouth, with lips and tongue and unbridled passion.
    Walking her backward into her flat and taking her on whatever surface they bumped into first. Table, counter, sofa, coffee table...even the floor itself.
    Bringing her home with him and making love to her in his own bed. On satin sheets, with moonlight streaming across their naked bodies and bringing out the highlights in her dark blond hair.
    The one that was bound to cause him the most trouble, however, was of watching her saunter into his office under the pretense of work, only to have him strip her of those sexy schoolmarm eyeglasses, pull the pins from her upswept hair and shag her brains out in the middle of his desk.
    It was the single, red-hot thought spiraling through his mind and making it decidedly uncomfortable to walk the remaining distance to his office. She lifted her head as he approached, and he hoped to heaven she didn’t notice the state of his arousal behind the zip of his otherwise pressed and pristine trousers.
    “Good morning,” she greeted him.
    If her smile seemed a bit stiff or falsely bright, he pretended not to notice. She wasn’t