Meet Mr. Prince / Once a Cowboy...: Meet Mr. Prince

Good thing she’d arrived in the city a few days early. She’d quickly discovered her ideas of what New York women wear were wrong. First of all, she didn’t own anywhere near enough black. Second, she needed better walking boots that she could actually wear to the office—ones that wouldn’t be ruined by dirty snow and slush—because New York was definitely a walking city, which she actually liked.

Now, after a couple of necessary shopping trips, she felt as if she fit in. At least she wouldn’t look like a tourist.

She’d also scoped out the location of the Hunt Foundation’s New York office (only a couple of blocks away from the corporate apartment), the closest Starbucks (after all, she was a Seattle girl, and if she couldn’t have her daily fix of her sister Bobbie’s brew, she’d take theirs) and the best place to buy tickets to hear classical musicians she admired (this she was still investigating).

Now she was armed and ready to meet her new boss.

Dressed in black wool pants, her new black boots, businesslike white blouse, lightweight black cardigan and a good-looking black wool coat she’d bought on sale at Bloomingdale’s, she left the apartment at 8:25, even though supposedly the office didn’t open for business until nine. Why so late? she wondered. Seattle offices started their workday at eight. Did a nine o’clock start have something to do with being on Eastern Time? She guessed it didn’t really matter. There was a Starbucks conveniently close by; she’d just duck in there and get a skinny latte.

Latte in hand, she arrived at the foundation office eight minutes before nine, at the same time an attractive redhead was unlocking the door. The redhead looked up. “Hi. Can I help you?”

“I’m Georgie Fairchild. I—”

“Oh, yes, of course. We’re expecting you. I’m Deborah Zelinsky, the office manager here.” She pulled off a wool glove and stuck out her right hand. “C’mon in. I generally get here earlier, but my son woke up with a stomachache and, well, you know …”

Georgie nodded, although she really didn’t know … and didn’t want to know what it must be like to be both mother and employee. She felt capable of many things, but juggling two such important roles seemed to her to be the ultimate in self-sacrifice. She had nothing but admiration for working mothers—for all mothers—but was glad she’d realized early on that role wasn’t for her.

Following Deborah into the office, Georgie quickly saw it wasn’t a fancy place. Not that she’d expected it to be. Most foundations, even well-funded ones, didn’t waste money on frills. And if they did, then they were suspect in Georgie’s eyes.

Substance over flash, that was Georgie’s credo.

Deborah dumped her handbag and a paper sack onto a desk in the outer office and gestured to a group of chairs against the wall. “Have a seat. Let me get things turned on and organized, then I’ll show you around.”

“Okay.” But Georgie didn’t sit down. Instead she walked over to the opposite wall where several black-and-white framed photographs were hung. She studied them with interest. The first showed a familiar actor shaking hands with Bill Clinton. She idly wondered why a photo of Patrick Dempsey would be hanging in the foundation’s office. Had he made a big contribution or been involved in a recent humanitarian effort on behalf of the foundation? He and the former president were the only ones she recognized. The other photos were of people she didn’t know, people who were obviously either supporters or workers for the foundation. She only glanced at them, thinking it was likely one of the men in those photos was her new boss, Zachary Prince.

“Miss Fairchild?”

Georgie whipped around. She hadn’t heard Deborah’s return.

“Our one claim to fame,” Deborah said, walking over and pointing to the photo of the actor and Bill Clinton.

“What did Patrick Dempsey do for the foundation?” Georgie asked.

Deborah rolled her eyes. “Oh, boy. Zach hates that.”

“Hates what?”

“When people think he’s Patrick Dempsey. He gets it all the time. Women have been known to follow him on the street. One or two have even followed him to the office. And let’s not even talk about the paparazzi.” She shook her head. “They’ve been fooled by the resemblance, too.”

Georgie stared at Deborah. “That’s Zachary Prince? Not Patrick Dempsey?”

“Yep. That’s Zach.”

Geez Louise. Georgie didn’t trust gorgeous men. In fact, aside from Alex, she’d never met one who wasn’t full of himself. I knew I wasn’t going to like this assignment, and that conviction just got a lot stronger.

Deborah was still chuckling as she said, “C’mon, I’ll give you the ten-cent tour now.”

It didn’t take long to see the rest of the offices. There were only three of them, plus a small conference room, a tiny kitchen and a unisex bathroom. The largest office was Zachary Prince’s, Deborah explained. Georgie only caught a glimpse of it, because they didn’t go inside. The office assigned to Georgie was directly across the hall, and next door to hers was an office that was used by everyone and anyone associated with the foundation at any given time.

“Including visitors and temporary help,” Deborah said. “We pretty much operate on a shoestring. Zach doesn’t believe in wasting money that can be used in better places.”

Good, Georgie thought. At least he and she would agree in one area. “Where is Mr. Prince?”

Deborah smiled. “Oh, don’t call him Mr. Prince. He’d hate that, too. He’s Zach to everyone.”

Georgie noticed that Deborah hadn’t answered her question. She was just about to pose it again, when Deborah said, “To answer your question, Zach doesn’t usually get here before ten.”

Oh, really? Strike two, Georgie thought, only barely preventing herself from rolling her eyes the way Deborah had earlier. Georgie could just imagine why he couldn’t make it in early. She’d known a few of his type—pretty boys who did the club scene at night. No wonder Alex was concerned about the New York office, even if he hadn’t seen fit to tell her exactly why he was concerned.

She was still thinking about the things Deborah had told her, even as she unpacked her satchel and arranged the supplies piled upon her desk. She hoped she was wrong. She hoped Zach Prince would turn out to be just as great as Alex had made him out to be. But she had a bad feeling that Alex had kept things from her.

And even if he hadn’t, even if he really thought Zachary Prince was terrific, there was always a first time to be fooled, especially when you were operating long distance from each other. In fact, maybe the reason they so desperately needed to hire an assistant here was because the assistant actually did all the work. And who knew? Maybe down deep, Alex suspected as much, even if he wouldn’t, or couldn’t, put his suspicions into words.

Georgie had just finished setting everything up to her liking, booting up her company-issue laptop and logging on to the employee section of the foundation’s website, where she’d begun reading the reports of weekend activity posted by various field agents and other foundation employees, when she heard a male voice talking to Deborah, then the footsteps of someone coming down the hall.

Mr. Gorgeous had finally arrived, she guessed.

Sure enough, a few seconds later, the Patrick Dempsey lookalike stood in her open doorway. “Good morning,” he said.

Bad night, she thought, eyeing his rumpled, longish black hair and tired eyes. Probably out way too late. “Good morning.”

“Zach Prince,” he said, walking in. He wore a dark business suit under a black topcoat.

Georgie stood. “Georgie Fairchild.” They shook hands. His handshake was firm but not crushing, a minor point in his favor. Georgie hated when men tried to show you how strong they were with a handshake from hell.

He looked at her desk. “Sorry I wasn’t here earlier, but I see Deborah has taken care of you.”

“Yes, she has.”

“Give me a half hour or so to get some things organized, then we’ll talk.”

If Georgie had been him, she’d have been here an hour before the new person was scheduled to arrive. She’d have been ready to talk immediately. “All right,” she agreed.

Not a good beginning, she thought as she watched him walk across the hall and into his office. When he shut the door behind him, she shook her head. Not a good beginning at all.

Hell, Zach thought. He could see, just from the way she looked at him, that Georgie Fairchild was judging him and finding him wanting. He could easily imagine what she thought. Not only was he later than usual—10:30 by his watch—but he probably looked like he’d been out all night. Added to that was the way he looked, which caused people who didn’t know him to think he was a lightweight.

One look at Georgie Fairchild and anyone could see that she wasn’t a lightweight. Her height alone—Zach guessed she was about five ten or eleven—would be intimidating to a lot of people. It wasn’t to Zach—he was well over six feet himself—but he would imagine it gave her an advantage in a lot of situations.

In addition to her height were businesslike clothes, a utilitarian watch, no jewelry except tiny diamond earrings, thick wheat-blond hair pulled back into a no-nonsense ponytail, cool green eyes, subtle makeup—it was obvious to anyone that here was a young woman who was capable, efficient and self-confident.

Zach groaned inwardly. All his reservations about Georgie Fairchild bubbled up. He’d been right to be concerned. Having her here was not a good idea. Zach felt like picking up the phone and calling Alex right now and saying, “No way, José.” So what if she had an honorary seat on the HuntCom board?

In fact, if she gave him one bit of trouble, she was going to be out of here. But if worse came to worst, if Alex really had sent her here for some ulterior motive, then Zach’s ongoing work-versus home dilemma might solve itself.

Feeling better now that he’d decided on his modus operandi, he booted up his laptop and opened his email account.

It was almost 11:30 before Zach—she couldn’t keep referring to him as Zachary Prince, even in her own mind—called Georgie into his office. She kept telling herself to keep an open mind, but if she was being honest with herself, she’d admit she’d pretty much formed her opinion of him already. Maybe he was as good as Alex had said he was, but his work habits told another story.

He stood as she walked into the office. Okay, so he’d been taught nice manners and they extended into the workplace, but as far as Georgie was concerned, standing for her was another strike against him, because all the gesture meant was that he thought of her more as a woman than a colleague.

“I understand you got here on Friday,” he said as they both took a seat—him behind the desk, her in one of the two chairs flanking it. There was also a long leather sofa along the side wall and several framed watercolors hanging above it.

“Yes.”

He must have noticed her looking at the watercolors, because he said, “My sister painted those.”

“They’re lovely.” And they were. Georgie would have liked to look at them more closely.

“Thank you,” he said, still in that rather formal voice. “So, have you been to the city before?”

“No, this is my first time.”

“What do you think of it?”

“So far, I like it.”

“How’s the apartment?”

“It’s very nice, thank you.” Georgie hesitated, then added, “I appreciate that you stocked the pantry and refrigerator for me.”

“That was Deborah’s doing.”

“I’ll have to thank her, then.”

For a few minutes, they talked about the sights she’d taken in over the weekend, and just as Georgie was beginning to think he’d never get down to business, he said, “Shall we get started?”

I thought you’d never ask. “I’m ready anytime you are.”

He picked up a large blue bound notebook, and as he did so, Georgie noticed the two framed photos on his desk, which the notebook had partially hidden. Without staring, she could see that one was a photo of three children—one of whom looked quite young—and the other was of a very pretty dark-haired woman.

So maybe he wasn’t a playboy type? Of course, the kids could be nieces and nephews. The woman could be the sister he’d mentioned, but she couldn’t imagine any man keeping his sister’s framed picture on his desk.

Even though she’d thought she wasn’t obviously looking, she must have been, because he said, “My family.”

Georgie’s eyes met his. “Nice looking.”

“Thank you.”

He looked away, but not before she caught a glimpse of some emotion in his eyes she didn’t quite understand. It almost looked like sadness. Surely not. But as quickly as it had appeared, the emotion, whatever it was, had disappeared.

For the next hour they pored over the various grants the eastern division of the foundation had pledged in the past quarter and the projects they were in the process of considering, plus a list of possible beneficiaries that had had preliminary vetting but which needed in-depth research and investigation. Zach also handed her a stack of grant applications that hadn’t been vetted at all. “We call these our slush pile,” he said.

As Zach talked, giving her background material and status reports, Georgie had to admit he seemed to know his business. He answered all her questions thoroughly and only once had to refer to another source to give her the information she requested. After a while, he seemed to warm up to her, and once or twice he actually smiled.

Good heavens, that smile should be banned, she thought as she found herself responding to its warmth … and potent sexiness. This last thought alarmed her so much she actually backed up in her chair. The last thing she wanted—or needed—was to feel any attraction, even the tiniest bit, for Zachary Prince. She kept her expression as businesslike and cool as she could manage while reminding herself he was a) so not her type, b) her boss, and c), most importantly, married.

She tried to banish her disturbing thoughts with limited success. Finally they finished with the blue book, which Zach had told her they called their bible, and he said, “Since it’s already one o’clock, why don’t you take a lunch break? In the meantime, I’ll ask Deborah to pull all the active files for you to study this afternoon. I’d like you to pay particular attention to the Carlyle Children’s Cancer Center because that’s the first possible beneficiary I want you to do a final evaluation on.”

“All right.” She couldn’t wait to get back to her office. And away from him.

“If you have questions, make a note of them. We can discuss them tomorrow morning.” Then he added, “I won’t be here this afternoon.” His blue eyes met hers squarely. This time he didn’t smile. Nor did he offer any explanation.

Georgie told herself he was the boss and he had a perfect right to come and go as he pleased. And he certainly didn’t have to justify himself to her, did he? Besides, he could have perfectly legitimate business to take care of. She told herself where he might be going or what he might be doing wasn’t her concern and she shouldn’t jump to any conclusions. She told herself she was there to do a job, that Alex had not asked her to report back about Zach or his work habits and no matter how she felt about Zach herself, she was going to do that job to the best of her ability. And she was going to keep her relationship with Zach strictly business. In fact, the less she knew about him and the less she saw of him, the better off she’d be. She might not have been here long, but she already knew Zachary Prince was bad news—on more than one level.

As Georgie returned to her office, she couldn’t help thinking how right she’d been to resist coming to New York.

Chapter Four

“I’m glad you could come in this afternoon, Mr. Prince. I know you’re a busy man.”

Zach liked the counselor at his children’s private school. Celeste Fouchet had proven herself to be compassionate and intelligent, and she had a great rapport with the students. Katie liked her; he knew she did, even though his daughter didn’t talk about her counseling sessions at home.

“Nothing is more important than my children,” he said, taking the seat the counselor had indicated.

“I noticed that Katie is out sick today,” Miss Fouchet said.

“Yes. She’s got a strep infection. Dr. Noble saw her this morning and said we’d need to keep her home until she’s no longer contagious.”

“Well, I hope she feels better soon.” The counselor smiled. “The reason I asked you to come and see me is I’m still a bit worried about Katie.” Unlike some others who might have avoided his eyes or fiddled with something on her desk, she met his gaze directly.

In her gray eyes, he saw sympathy. His heart sank. He’d hoped the summons from the counselor had meant that Katie didn’t need additional help, that she’d finally accepted her mother’s death.

“I thought she was doing really well,” he said. “I haven’t heard her crying at night in a long time.”

Miss Fouchet nodded. “She is doing better, but she’s still not where I’d like her to be. She’s accepted her mother’s death, and she also knows no one is to blame, that it was the disease that took your wife, not anything she or anyone else did wrong. That’s a good thing, because for a long time she was secretly blaming herself.”

“Which was totally irrational.”

“Yes, but we all think irrational thoughts when we’re devastated by loss. Very few of us have objectivity in times of great pain.”

Zach sighed. “I know.” God knows that for a while he’d blamed himself, too. Why had he not seen Jenny’s symptoms so that he could have insisted she see a doctor sooner? If only he’d done this … or that … He grimaced. If only. Those two words were the most useless words in the dictionary. “What else can I do to help Katie?”

“Just keep doing what you’re doing: loving her and reassuring her anytime she begins to show signs of her fear of losing you, too.” The counselor gave him an understanding smile. “I know it’s hard. I know you want to make every bad thing go away for Katie, but healing from a loss like this is a slow process, Mr. Prince. It doesn’t happen overnight.”

“I know, but it has been two years.” Jeremy had seemed to snap back to his old self within months of Jenny’s death. Then again, he was only four when Jenny first got sick. He’d quickly adapted to the fact that his mother couldn’t do the things she’d always done, so her loss hadn’t affected him in the same way it had affected Katie. And me.

“Each of us is different. Some of us deal with these things better than others. In your case, you’re stronger than Katie … and wiser. For a girl, losing a mother is traumatic. And for a girl Katie’s age—on the cusp of her teen years—it’s life-changing. But your daughter is going to be all right, I feel quite sure of that. I just wanted you to know that we’re not there yet. And I wanted to tell you again now much I like your daughter.” Her expression softened. “Katie’s a special girl. She’s going to be a remarkable woman someday.”

Zach suddenly found it hard to speak around the lump in his throat. “She’s … very like her mother.”

The warmth in the counselor’s eyes said she understood exactly how he was feeling. “I suspected as much. She talks about her mother with so much … love and gentleness.”

Zach managed to get a grip on his emotions, but once he stepped outside and began the twenty-block walk home—he’d decided he could use the exercise today—that feeling of emptiness and loss returned with a strength he hadn’t felt in months. And he knew—sadly—that both he and his oldest daughter, at least, still had a ways to go before they’d be completely whole again.

“So how was your first day at work?”

Georgie made a face. “It was fine.”

“Georgie, I can tell just by the tone of your voice that it wasn’t fine,” Joanna said.

So Georgie, who hadn’t planned to say a word until Joanna had called and begun pumping her, spilled the whole story—how Zach Prince had showed up at the office so late, how he’d skipped out again without any explanation about where he might be going, how she felt even more uneasy about him now than she’d felt before—and then she even found herself telling Joanna how good-looking he was.

“Really?” Joanna said. “He actually looks like Patrick Dempsey? Gee, he can’t be that hard to work with, then. At least you’ve got something great to look at! I mean, he didn’t act obnoxious or anything, did he?”

“No.”

“Well, then? How bad can it be? Just sit back and enjoy the scenery for a while.”

Joanna’s comments caused Georgie to remember what she’d said to her sisters a while back when they’d started bugging her about getting married. “What?” Bobbie had said. “You’re going to go without sex for the rest of your life?” And Georgie had laughed and retaliated, saying she hadn’t said a thing about going without sex, that she intended to have plenty of lovers.

Now why on earth had Joanna’s comment about Zach made her think of that conversation?

“Speaking of scenery,” Georgie said, “how’s your romance going?”

“Chick’s wonderful,” Joanna said dreamily. “Oh, Georgie, you should try it.”

“Try what?” But Georgie knew.

“Being in love. There’s no feeling like it in the world.”

Later that night, as Georgie slathered moisturizer on her face in preparation for bed, she thought about her conversation with Joanna again. She was glad she hadn’t confessed the momentary attraction she’d felt toward Zach, especially since soon after that she’d discovered he was married. Georgie knew it wasn’t uncommon to be attracted to people who were out of bounds. Shoot, she wouldn’t be human if she could turn off physical reactions the way you turned off a TV remote. Still, the memory of her involuntary physical response to Zach’s smile continued to plague her even after she’d climbed into bed and turned off the bedside lamp, because it had been such a strong response, the likes of which she hadn’t had in a long time.

Her last thought before drifting off to sleep was that tomorrow she would redouble her efforts to be a perfectly controlled, perfectly businesslike employee. And hopefully, her future assignments would keep her well away from the office … and from Zachary Prince and his damned smile.

“You look beautiful, as always, Corny.”

Cornelia kept her voice light as she answered, although the expression in Harry’s dark eyes unleashed some unwanted butterflies. “Always the flatterer, aren’t you, Harry?”

He smiled. “I mean every word. No one would ever believe you’re sixty-six. Why, today you don’t look a day over forty.”

“Oh, please,” Cornelia scoffed. “Don’t exaggerate. Fifty maybe. But forty?”

“You’re more beautiful now than you were as a young girl,” he insisted.

The two of them were having a late lunch at a charming lodge-type restaurant out near the Hunt mansion. It was a typical Seattle winter day—cold and gloomy and threatening rain at any moment—but the lodge had a cheery fire going in their big stone fireplace, and Harry had secured a table close by the inviting warmth. And, of course, Cornelia had ridden to their lunch date in comfort and style, because Harry had sent Walter, his long-time driver, to pick her up in the Lincoln Town Car.

“You don’t look so bad yourself,” she said with a chuckle. “For a seventy-two-year-old man, that is.” Harry was still as tall as he’d been as a young man—topping six feet four—with the hawklike features and thick hair that had always been the standard by which Cornelia measured other men.

He laughed. “You just couldn’t resist letting me know that I’m an old geezer, could you?”

“You know I was teasing you.”

His smile faded, and he reached across the table to take her hand. “Were you? Maybe you really do think I’m too old.”

Cornelia’s wayward heart betrayed her at the look in his eyes. What was happening here? she wondered. She was afraid to hope. For so long, she’d hoped to no avail. She couldn’t go through that again. She’d been disappointed too many times. “Too old for what, Harry?” she said carefully.