Double-Cross My Heart Read Free

only sexy as hell, she’d turned out to be a good person, in his estimate. A rarity in business, Eden appeared to be a straight-shooter, with a minimum of bull.
    He liked her almost as much as he hungered for her.
    With an inward smile, Alex acknowledged the irony of the situation. It would serve him right if he fell for a woman originally intended to be his quarry. For all Eden’s competence and her urban gloss, she possessed a honesty and directness he found compellingly sexy.
    He very much hoped she wouldn’t fight him in his takeover bid with Michele Cosmetics. For the first time, he found himself thinking and re-thinking his plans—obsessing almost—to make especially sure the other person didn’t get hurt.
    It was his usual preference for business to be as painless as possible, but he’d never been this careful before. He wanted to come out of this takeover with all the goodies, Eden included.
    If the two of them could jump the hurdle of his acquiring Michele Cosmetics, who knew what might happen between them? He knew as he sat here with her that he didn’t want to be anywhere else.
    “Oh, this is a good way to end the day, having dinner with you,” she said as she leaned back in the booth, the sleek cap of her short, dark hair brushing against the seat. “I was needing to laugh.”
    “Another rough day at work?” he asked sympathetically.
    Eden shrugged. “Wendi is impossible. It’s crazy to think of making her CEO of Michele Cosmetics. Michele’s new boyfriend has completely stolen her common sense. I’d really thought better of her. Before him, she was a sane woman. Now I think I could get a judge to agree she’s suffering from some kind of insanity in the last three months. The damned woman never works!”
    “Wendi or Michele?” Alex asked as he leaned forward to fill her glass. Eden’s boss was an old woman well beyond her productive years, but he knew Eden still felt a tie with Michele.
    “Both! Michele gave the Pretty Me make-up line to Wendi, but she refuses to take care of it. She hands everything off to me. I’m directing the development of new products for the line, overseeing the marketing campaign, making the production decisions. Everything.”
    “If its her responsibility, why do you handle it?”
    Eden looked surprised. “Because the line will suffer if I don’t take care of it. Someone has to make marketing and product decisions.”
    “But if you didn’t step in, Michele would soon see that Wendi’s not doing her job.”
    “I’m not so sure. Michele’s rarely in the office these days. She spends most of her time vacationing with Carl,” Eden said, shaking her head. “And by the time, she did notice a problem, the ‘Pretty Me’ line would be significantly damaged. We’d suffer a loss of revenue.”
    Alex heard the possessiveness in her voice, watching her as she took a sip of her water. It troubled him that she was still so tied to the company he planned to dismantle, but he brushed the thought away, concentrating on all the opportunities she’d have once free of Michele Cosmetics. In truth, she was getting a raw deal at the company. She deserved better.
    “Would it seem like tattling to tell Michele that Wendi’s not doing her job?” he asked with sympathy, letting his gaze linger pleasurably on her face.
    “I have told her,” Eden said with frustration. “But despite all our years of working together, Michele won’t hear a word I have to say now. She is truly behind Wendi. Or behind Carl who is, of course, Wendi’s uncle! And Carl is all that matters to Michele now so she supports Wendi’s every suggestion, applauds her so-called ‘innovations’ and generally makes an ass of herself when it comes to anyone questioning Wendi.”
    Watching her, Alex recognized and regretted Eden’s frustration level. She was getting crap all the way around, mostly due to choices that were not her own.
    He wanted to make it better for her. Whether she knew it or not, what