Page 36 of The Playboy's Most Unexpected Baby

His hand squeezed hers. His eyelids fluttered closed.

Was this really happening?

Olivia felt dizzy. He was her husband. In theory, the bizarre thing was that this hadn’t happened before now. In practice, of course, things were completely unpredictable between the two of them. Nothing about their relationship had ever been ordinary.

She was about to kiss her husband, and it felt like she was jumping — like she was falling — off a cliff.

No. I can’t do this. I can’t!

She cared deeply for him. He meant a great deal to her. But that didn’t change the kind of person he was. It didn’t change the fact that he was someone who would leave her behind and go back to his life of womanizing and one-night stands. And that wasn’t who Olivia was. She didn’t want to open herself up to the possibility of getting hurt like that.

She dropped his hand and pulled away. “I think I’ve had enough wine,” she said quietly. “I think I should probably go lie down.”

She got to her feet and hurried from the room before he could say another word.

CHAPTER14

CHARLIE

Work was the only thing that got Charlie’s mind off of Olivia in the days following their near-kiss.

He had never cared about work before. He had taken the job on the board of his father’s company because it had been handed to him when he’d turned twenty-two, and he had kept it all these years because, in a way, it had allowed him to feel close to his family, even though they had never tried to be particularly close to him. Walking through the halls of his father’s building, he could remember what it had been like to be here as a child, to play in the break room while his father worked, to feed quarters into the vending machines and get sodas and candy bars and feel like the whole world belonged to him.

Now that he actually had a job here, he didn’t feel nearly so on top of the world. It was much harder to make sense of his place in this company these days.

On one hand, everyone did treat him very well. Even the upper management inclined their heads to him when he passed and called himMr. Coldwell, as if he had some position of authority here. He didn’t, of course. He was only a member of the board because he had been placed there by his father. He probably knew less about the inner workings of the company than an entry-level coder.

Today, he sat in a meeting in one of the conference rooms, taking notes on a piece of paper. It was more than he usually did. He usually tried to avoid attending these meetings at all, and when he did come, he certainly never took notes. He attended when he was told that the board needed a quorum to pass a vote about something or other, and when that happened, he would usually speak to one of his father’s trusted associates — one of the oldest and most established members of the board — to find out where he ought to vote. He couldn’t recall ever having researched the issue at hand to make a decision for himself.

Today’s meeting was about the prospect of making a new appointment to the board. “We don’t really need anyone else,” said Thomas Sanderson, who had been Charlie’s father’s second in command up until his retirement. “The board we have has functioned well for decades.”

“But Harris wants to retire,” said Cory Ames. Cory was one of the youngest board members, only a few years older than Charlie himself. He had been appointed to the board after making a breakthrough in the field of robotics that had changed the industry. He was a household name these days, and everyone had known that if he hadn’t been given a position on the board, he would have left the company and gone into business for himself. It had been the only way to keep him on staff. It was a decision that Charlie agreed with — Cory was one of the brightest minds at the company.

“So Harris will retire,” Thomas said. “That won’t change anything. Harris hasn’t attended these meetings in almost a year. Look around you. He isn’t here today.”

It was true. It was high time for Howard Harris to retire. He was in his seventies, and he’d been with the company since the very beginning.

“We can do this without his help,” Thomas insisted. “We don’t need him.”

“Maybe we don’t,” Cory agreed. “But we do needpeople, and you know that, Thomas. Harris retiring is one thing, but what happens to this company when you retire?”

“I don’t have plans to retire.”

“Ever?”

“When I do, you can talk about expanding the board. But it won’t be any time soon.”

“Now, hold on,” Charlie spoke up, for he had just realized how little sense that argument made. “You’re suggesting that we shouldn’t expand the board until we absolutely have to do it? But we need a quorum to add new members to the board. They have to be approved by at least five votes. How are we going to get the five votes if we wait until we don’t have the full board to evencalla vote. Bad enough that we have to try to do it without Harris — there are only seven of us here now.”

“You’ll never get five of this seven to approve what you’re suggesting,” Thomas said.

“And you think it will be easier if we wait until there are only six?”

“Charlie’s right,” Cory said. “That’s exactly why we need to have the vote right now, today. It’s the reason we can’t afford to wait.”

“We shouldn’t rush,” Thomas said. “There’s no reason we need to do this hastily, and we shouldn’t just accept the very first person suggested to us.”

“She’s a good suggestion, though,” Charlie said.

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