Page 7 of Single Dad Christmas

I hate you,he re-read, trying to imagine the giggling, chubby little three-year-old Taylor had beenevertyping those words and sending them to him. Back then, parenting had been easy, and his marriage reasonably happy.

He’d been Taylor’s hero and letting her snuggle into his lap while he read her a picture book had been the beginning and end of what she’d wanted in her day. She’d particularly loved The Gruffalo, and he’d read each page with the voices of the characters. When they reached the end, she’d clap her hands, look at him expectantly, and say, “Again?” He’d always relent, no matter what else he had on that evening. She was his daughter, and he would have moved heaven and earth for her.

He still would, but it was a lot harder to look forward to getting home at the end of the day when he never knew what particular kind of thunderstorm would be waiting to greet him.

So maybe he’d been a little harsher on Louisa from the agency than he’d needed to be.

Or maybe he hadn’t been hard enough.

In truth, hot on the heels of the message from Taylor that morning, and with the abysmal response from the advertising campaign—which had resulted in sub-par bookings—he’d stormed into the meeting prepared to fire the agency, to hell with how well they’d done for him in the past.

He’d been livid. Admittedly, there’d been some splash back courtesy of his daughter’s text, but mostly, it had been about Donovan and his incompetence.

Louisa—what was her last name? He looked down at the business card she’d pushed across the table in a flurry of apologies for Donovan’s absence. Louisa Petrakis. Greek? Moricosian? No matter. Louisa Petrakis had succeeded in talking him off the ledge with her unexpected and beguiling habit of being honest. And brave. By taking responsibility for the agency’s mess.

It was the trait he admired most of all. He didn’t mind mistakes. Everyone made them. What he cared about was a person’s ability to take responsibility and fix their mess.

His desk phone buzzed so he pressed the button to allow the intercom onto speaker.

“The suite of rooms are ready, sir, and Mr Conroy has informed me that Louisa Petrakis is on her way over.”

“Excellent.” He liked it when things went to plan, and his unflappable Sydney-based assistant Rose achieved that every time. She was worth her weight in gold. “Let me know when she gets here.”

“Yes, sir.”

He turned off the phone and pushed back in his chair, staring out at the view. It was a strikingly beautiful day, crystal clear, and very hot, so he’d gone for a run well before sunrise that morning, in an effort to escape the worst of the stifling heat. He was already looking forward to a swim after work.

Only, right as he imagined that moment of diving into his rooftop infinity pool, and letting the worries of the day slip over him, an image of Louisa popped into his mind. Not as she’d been that morning, in his office, dressed in a neat grey suit with her shiny hair pulled into a low ponytail. Not Louisa with her minimal makeup that highlighted the classical beauty of her face and features, with full, pouting lips, dimples in her cheeks, and warm brown eyes. Not Louisa with perfectly trimmed nails and obvious fear that she was about to lose an important client.

But as she might look at his home, totally relaxed and in a bathing suit, diving into the water beside him, her skin gleaming from sunshine and water, her smile broad as she turned to him and laughed.

He sat up straighter as the unintended image infiltrated his body and began to take hold, flooding him with a kind of need he hadn’t known in a long time. A very long time.

When had he last been with a woman, much less looked at one? He stood up quickly, trying to rid himself of a very unwelcome awareness, suddenly, of Louisa as a woman, and groaned to realise that his body had other ideas. He rearranged himself in his pants, grateful to be alone, because he definitely didn’t need anyone else catching him with a visible erection.

His phone buzzed once more. He clicked the button, hoping the sound of Rose would do the trick. She was not someone he’d ever found remotely desirable, even though, he supposed, she was quite pretty.

“Sir, Miss Petrakis is here. Shall I send her in?”

“No!” He responded, glancing downwards with shock. Then, cursing inwardly, he shook his head. “Give me two minutes, then I’ll meet her in the foyer. I’ve just got…something I’m dealing with first.”

“No problems.” Rose disconnected the intercom, and he tilted his head back with a weary laugh.

Great.

Just great.

He’d found the solution to his advertising issue; he was sure of it. Only Louisa Petrakis still might turn out to be more trouble than she was worth, if he wasn’t very, very careful.

He strodeinto the foyer at the exact moment the sun seemed to burst through the glass, like an arrow of gold, spearing him and bathing him in the sort of light that would stay in her memory for a long time. If she was a painter, she would have itched to pick up a canvas and render his image, exactly like this, for all time.

He was…beautiful.There was no other word for it. From his angular, symmetrical face to those deeply expressive eyes, his patrician nose and sculpted cheekbones, and a body that was lean yet strong, she felt his beauty on a powerful, soul-deep level. Anyone on earth would have recognized his physical traits, but it was so much more than that.

Noah Fox’s particular brand of beauty was like a magnet, and the closer he came to her, the more he sent whatever magnets inhabited her cells into total disarray, so they were jangling and jumping all over the place, making her jumpy and over-alert.

“Hi,” she said, her voice husky and low, and totally unprofessional. Her eyes flared wide and she grimaced. “Hello,” she tried again, then wished she hadn’t when Noah’s lips quirked in an appreciative smile.

Was he laughing at her?

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