Center Stage (22 page)
Authors: Bernadette Marie
Tags: #Romance, #Contemporary, #Contemporary Romance, #bestselling author, #5 Prince Publishing, #Bernadette Marie
The man led her to an office, and the name on the door read EDUARDO KELLER. She sucked in a breath as he opened the door and walked in.
“Have a seat.” He pointed to the chairs in front of the desk.
Darcy took a seat, set her bag to the side, and then slid her arms through the sleeves of the jacket he’d draped on her. She probably looked ridiculous. He was at least six feet tall and broad shouldered. She wasn’t very tall at all, and she didn’t even come close to filling out the jacket.
The man sat behind the desk and turned on the computer monitor.
“Should you be doing that,” she asked?
“I need to find the application information to fill out for the human resource department.”
“You’re going to fill it out?”
“I usually do when I’m hiring people.”
She looked around the office. Eduardo Keller had no personal affects. The man must be all business.
“Why are you doing the hiring?”
The man stopped what he was doing. He folded his hands on the top of the desk and gazed at her with dark brown eyes.
“Because I’m Ed Keller.”
Ed had seen his share of angry women in his life. When this woman’s face turned the color of Santa’s suit, he knew he’d crossed the line.
She stood from the chair and grabbed her bag. “Do you think this is funny? You’re messing with my life.”
“Whoa.” He stood from his seat. “Calm down.”
“Calm down? I will not calm down.”
“I’ve seen your resume. You’re very qualified for the position I need to fill, and I’d like to help you.”
“Help me?” She lifted the bag onto her shoulder. “Help me? Why would you want to do that? You’re just some stuck up executive who can play with people, like spilling coffee on a woman to get her into your office. Is this what you do here?”
Ed planted his hands firmly on his desk and looked at her. “You told me you had three days to find a job. You told me I ruined all your chances by messing up your blouse. So you can either hear me out, or you can leave here with your stained clothing, your wrinkled resume, and your bad attitude and find a job.”
The woman sucked in a breath and let it out slowly. “What is the job?”
“Executive assistant.”
“To you?”
“Yes.”
Her shoulders dropped, and she bit her bottom lip. She was contemplating, but he didn’t know, in his own heart, which way he wanted her to go now. It was very likely he’d just made a big mistake offering it to her if she was so volatile.
The woman set her bag back on the ground and extended her hand to him. “Darcy McCary, your new assistant.”
Darcy studied Eduardo Keller as he shook her hand. Was he happy? Mad? Oh, he’d been messing with her, and now she really felt stupid. But she needed the job, and he was right—she was very qualified. She needed to find an apartment and establish some savings. Private investigators hadn’t been cheap, and she couldn’t tell her father that she’d hired them.
She had a debt to pay and a life to understand—her life.
Darcy McCary was in Tennessee to find her birth mother, and the investigator told her that all ties led to Nashville and to Benson, Benson, and Hart.
Meet the Author
Bernadette Marie has been an avid writer since the early age of 13, when she’d fill notebook after notebook with stories that she’d share with her friends. Her journey into novel writing started the summer before eighth grade when her father gave her an old typewriter. At all times of the day and night you would find her on the back porch penning her first work, which she would continue to write for the next 22 years.
In 2007 – after marriage, filling her chronic entrepreneurial needs, and having five children – Bernadette began to write seriously with the goal of being published. That year she wrote 12 books. In 2009 she was contracted for her first trilogy and the published author was born. In 2011 she (being the entrepreneur that she is) opened her own publishing house, 5 Prince Publishing, and has released contemporary titles and began the process of taking on other authors in other genres.
In 2012 Bernadette Marie found herself on the bestsellers lists of iTunes and Amazon to name a few. Her office wall is lined with colorful Post It notes with the titles of books she will be releasing in the very near future, with hope that they too will grace the bestsellers lists.
Bernadette spends most of her free time driving her kids to their many events. She is also an accomplished martial artist who earned her conditional second degree black belt in Tang Soo Do in October 2012. An avid reader, she enjoys most, the works of Nora Roberts, Karen White, and Megan Hart, to name a few. She loves to meet readers who enjoy reading contemporary romances and she always promises Happily Ever After.
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