Page 15 of His Secretary's Nine-Month Notice
But would he visit her?
She had been gone for six weeks and he’d kept in touch because, after all, they’d worked together as a team long enough for him to recognise that they had formed a bond, and besides, what if she returned to London? It would be tempting to rehire her because only now that she had disappeared he could see just how invaluable an asset she had been. More so than he could ever have expected. It was as though she had taken up permanent residence in some corner of his mind and had hunkered down to stay. So, hey, he could drop in...
After all, Never Kill Your Options had always been his motto.
She had replied to his emails as politely and remotely as if she had been sitting across from him in his office, fending off those personal questions she had always disliked being asked.
Yes, things were fine. Yes, her father was doing as well as could be expected. No, she had not reconsidered his job offer even though, yes, it would have been convenient as it was a mere half hour away from where she lived. The weather was good. The food was good. The people were friendly. The scenery was pleasing.
It piqued him to think that she hadn’t glanced back to the life she’d left behind and, were it not for his attempts to keep in touch, she would have galloped merrily into the distance in a cloud of dust.
He would look her up. Aside from anything else, it would be interesting to meet her father. Who didn’t enjoy meeting childhood idols?
Just out of curiosity, he’d put a few questions out there, asked around.
He’d been a fan of her father. The guy was well known. Even though he’d binned the touring a while back, people still knew who he was, and Matt had almost struck jackpot on question one.
Scott Dixon, one of the owners of his newly acquired start-up company, had waxed lyrical about Mickey Dunn, who was a familiar name in the music industry. He had recently set up his own small school for underprivileged, talented, budding musicians.
He was reportedly doing his first gig in six years at a hip, cool place in the heart of the city...with his daughter in attendance. As luck would have it, the gig coincided with when Matt would be there, sorting out his eleventh-hour road block. What were the chances?
He’d had a sudden image of Violet behind the scenes, always the carer, making sure her father didn’t go wild. She would be dressed in her formal business attire and would probably be directing traffic with all the roadies and fellow band members. He’d grinned fondly at the thought.
He’d debated whether to warn her of his arrival, and decided that he wouldn’t, because who knew whether work would allow him time out to see her at all? Or even whether hewoulddrop by. It could prove an awkward visit, best avoided. Rosy memories of his efficient secretary with the mystery background might be better left. After all, it wasn’t as though theirs had been a social relationship.
Armed with a shed-load of preconceived notions of what he might find, Matt had not catered for what he would actuallybe faced with. He’d imagined a queue of polite golden oldies filtering into a venue that, despite what he’d been told, wouldn’t be so much hip and cool as cultured and refined, befitting an ageing rocker who now ran a school for budding musicians.
Except, here he was now, and this wasn’t what he’d expected. Standing at a distance with the balmy night enfolding him, Matt surveyed the throng of people queuing and entering the exclusive venue. There was some rather stunning graffiti on the brick wall of the nightclub and two bouncers at the door, as though at any moment some disreputable troublemaker might attempt to barge the queue without a ticket.
He joined it. He knew from his research it was the second day of a two-day gig and he had only managed to get hold of a ticket by the skin of his teeth. Who knew that there would be so many old rockers lining up for a taste of the past? But then, it seemed that Mickey Dunn was quite the local celebrity.
He would surprise Violet after the concert. He imagined her anxiously sitting backstage, perhaps from a vantage point where she could keep a watchful eye on her father, making sure a bottle of beer wasn’t slipped to him by some well-intentioned groupie.
Matt was the last in. The club was exquisite, lots of exposed brick, long, oversized mirrors and some more graffiti. There were tables on either side of the room, raised on podiums, where dining happened. In the middle, it was standing room only. On the stage was a piano, the usual drums and a couple of guys with beards warming up. Not original band members but, from the tuning going on, Matt could tell that they were going to be pretty good.
His thoughts rambled. He felt invigorated, which surprised him, because until the very last minute he hadn’t been entirely convinced he would pay his ex-secretary a visit. Even more surprisingly, he recalled that weird feeling that had seized him when he’d been about to leave her house, when he’d stared down at her and it had been as though the world had suddenly narrowed right down to just the two of them, and something strong and urgent had been calling out to him to touch her. The urge to cover her mouth with his had been overwhelming.
He’d resisted, but with extreme difficulty.
Touching her, kissing her, thinking about making love to her... That was the stuff of madness, and he’d had the sense to steer clear.
But the power of temptation had left him shaken. Why had that memory leapt out at him from nowhere?
He almost missed what was going on because his thoughts had taken off at such a delightfully taboo tangent.
He almost missed Mickey Dunn coming onto the stage to rapturous applause. And Jesus...
He straightened. He couldn’t believe his eyes. He stared and his mouth fell open. From the back of the room—and even though at six foot two he towered over most of the audience there, so that his view was uninterrupted—he had to blink to process the sight of his prim and proper secretary dressed like a rocker.
He thought he might actually have made a choking sound under his breath. Surprise didn’t begin to cover his reaction. Gone were the prissy outfits he was accustomed to seeing her in. Not even jeans were in evidence. She was wearing a pair of micro denim shorts, black tights, biker boots and a cropped top, and her shoulder-length hair was braided into two stunted pigtails. She looked incredibly sexy, and he wasn’t the only guy captivated by the image, judging by the wolf whistles that greeted her appearance on stage.
Her father sat on a high stool with his guitar, with two band members in the background. She took up her position at the piano and...magic happened.
The world fell away as he listened to old ballads, the words of which he knew, and cover versions of a handful of well-known numbers. He couldn’t peel his eyes away from Violet, so absorbed in that piano, oblivious to everything around her. They ended on a couple of the band’s best-loved fast numbers, old rock hits that had the crowd chanting and singing along. Violet was into it, standing as she hit the notes on the piano, and every so often smiling across at her dad who grinned back at her.
Lots of perspiration, lots of noise, the roar of approval from the crowd, then it was over and the lights were going down, and Matt legged it to where he thought the dressing rooms would be.
If he’d had any doubts in his mind about showing up here on the other side of the world, and making time to seek her out, then those doubts had been erased.
