Overtime in the Boss's Bed (12 page)

‘What the—?’

‘You convinced me to play hooky today. You, with your constant smiles and upbeat peppiness and glass half-full crap.’ He jabbed a finger in her direction, his anger spilling out in a torrent. ‘
This
is why I don’t do involvement. It ruins concentration, ruins companies. You—’

‘Stop right there.’

Tears filled her eyes, turning them a luminous blue, and something broke inside him.

What had he done?

‘Starr—’

‘No!’

She blinked, the teardrops clinging to the ends of her lashes scattering like delicate rain before she shook her head.

‘Don’t say another word.’

Regret, anguish, loss, contorted her features as she backed away a few steps, before turning and making a run for the door.

He could have called out to her.

Dashed after her.

Implored her to listen.

He did none of those things.

Turning away, he stepped into the bathroom and slammed the door.

On the best thing that ever happened to him.

S
TARR SPRINTED TO
catch the last tram, ignoring the curious looks from passengers as she tripped up the steps and collapsed onto the nearest empty seat.

She hugged her bag close, comforted by its contents: her favourite audition outfit. Fluoro orange legwarmers, her oldest dance shoes, her lucky charm butterfly bracelet.

‘You’ve got the job, Miss Merriday. Welcome to Studio Bolero.’

The phrase still echoed through her head, had kept tempo with her feet as she’d run down the street to the tram stop. She should be ecstatic, should have twirled and jigged and allemanded her way onto the tram.

Instead she slunk into her seat, clutched her bag tight and tried to ignore the constant pain in her chest.

Damn Callum Cartwright for taking the gloss off her first dance job in Melbourne.

And damn him for breaking her heart.

She’d known it was all too good to be true: the cottage, the job, the incredible guy. All a mirage that had vanished as quickly as his supposed love for her.

Love? What a crock.

She should be thankful. When she’d taken the first flight out of Hayman Island, e-mailed him her resignation, it had taken her a day to do what she should have done the moment she landed in Melbourne.

Chase down more leads. Not settle for rejection. Push her way into auditions she knew she could nail, given half a chance.

And now she could move out of Kit’s uni friend’s halfway house again, and into a tiny apartment over the Studio Bolero.

She’d be gone before he returned—just the way she wanted.

She couldn’t face him. Not without hurling something at him. Not without verbally abusing him.

Her fingers flexed, digging into her straw bag, and her entire body was taut with tension.

She could kill him for what he’d done to her, to them, but that part of her life was over, finished. She had to get used to it.

This was what she wanted. Dance was her life.

The moment she’d stepped onto the old stage at the studio, surrounded by bright lights shielding the yawning seats in front of her, with dust motes from the heavy crimson velvet curtains shimmering under the spotlight, the distinctive smell of greasepaint lingering in the air, a sense of coming home had descended over her—a sense of belonging she found nowhere but in dance.

Then the music had started, a familiar tune from
Fame
sending a chill down her spine as she’d waited for the first kicked-up beat before spinning into her routine.

It came naturally now—the spins, the twirls, the lunges, the dramatic leap and roll at the end.

She’d done the entire audition by rote, eyes closed, feeling the music, feeling the beat, feeling alive.

No matter what she faced, dance was the one constant in her life. It had never let her down—unlike her poor choice in men.

‘Miss?’

Her eyes snapped open to find the conductor looming over her, and she flashed her ticket, sneaked a quick glance out of the window, grateful her stop was coming up.

The sooner she packed her backpack and headed back to Bolero, the sooner she could unwind. She needed a long, hot bath, an extra-strength hot chocolate and a night watching
Sex and the City
re-runs to clear her head.

She was doing the right thing.

Her life was back on track.

Then why did she still feel seriously derailed?

‘Have you heard from Dad?’

Callum quit staring into his coffee mug, glared at the phone where he had Rhys on loud speaker. ‘Don’t tell me. He rang you to sing my praises.’

‘You and me both, bro. Apparently I’m a disgrace to the Cartwright name. A good-for-nothing lout squandering my life.’

Callum winced. ‘Nice.’

‘The old man’s in top form. So what’s new?’

Callum leaned back, locked hands behind his head. ‘He rang me while I was on Hayman Island. Apparently taking my first day off in fourteen years resulted in the company losing a lucrative merger.’

Rhys swore. ‘Are you serious? Tell me you didn’t buy into his aggressive bull.’

His relationship with Starr was in tatters, he couldn’t concentrate on business, and the corporation had suffered a sizeable loss the last financial quarter, discounting the botched merger.

Serious? He was a walking disaster.

‘Cal? What did you do?’

Rhys paused, astute, assessing, and though they’d never been close Callum had a burning need to unburden to someone before he burst.

‘I stuffed up.

‘With the deal?’

‘And the rest.’

Rhys whistled, long and low. ‘You mucked up things with that hot PA, didn’t you?’

‘That’s putting it mildly.’

No matter how hard he tried to concentrate on business, he couldn’t wipe the image of her shattered expression, her tears, as he’d deliberately pushed her away because of his own failure.

The memory ate at him, leaving a residual ache in the vicinity of his heart.

He didn’t want to have this conversation, didn’t want to acknowledge that with every second without Starr he died a little inside.

‘Lovers’ tiff?’

The instant rebuttal died on his lips as he heard the genuine concern in Rhys’ voice.

‘It’s over.’

‘What happened?’

‘I blamed her. She distracted me. I played hooky for the day. The deal went south.’

Rhys let fly another pithy curse. ‘So you let the old man get to you. You should’ve run, like me, rather than get caught up in his bull.’

‘I’m not doing this for him.’

Rhys sighed. ‘I know, bro, you’re doing it for Archie. But how long are you going to live your life like this? You do nothing but work. You don’t have fun any more. You’re closed off to everyone. You—’

‘You’re not helping.’

‘Just saying it as it is.’

The annoying thing was, Rhys was right. The night Archie had died he’d turned his back on everything he’d ever enjoyed.

No more scuba-diving, parachuting, hang-gliding.

No more parties, dating, drinking.

He’d shut himself off physically, emotionally, and it had taken a wild, sassy dancer with long legs to revive him.

And what had he done?

Shoved her away as hard as he could.

‘Do you care about her?’

He stood, started pacing his office, sending the phone a ferocious glare.

‘Damn straight I do.’

‘Then start grovelling.’

Rhys chuckled, though he found nothing about this situation remotely funny. He needed to swallow a bottle of antacids to douse the anxiety burning him up inside.

‘Come on bro, get off your moral high horse, stop convincing yourself you’re better off without her, and go apologise before it’s too late.’

‘So says the relationship expert.’

‘Hey, when was
your
last relationship, Romeo?’

‘When was yours?’

Rhys laughed, and Callum managed a wry grin. They never talked like this. He’d been focussed on business, and Rhys had flung himself into his adventurous life overseas. It had been this way for years.

Then it hit him.

While he’d been caught up in Cartwrights, caught up in making up for his mistakes, his younger brother had grown into a man: a decent man. A man who cared enough to ring a brother who rarely returned the sentiment, a man who cared enough to offer advice, a man who just plain listened.

All the good intentions in the world wouldn’t make Archie come back, and he needed to start building bridges with the one brother he had left.

‘I’m sorry I’ve ignored you all these years.’

Rhys paused, cleared his throat, his voice strangely husky when he spoke. ‘Where is my brother and what have you done with him?’

‘Quit it.’

‘Seriously, bro. I’ve never heard you so emotional. You don’t do the broken heart thing well.’

‘Shut up and listen—’

‘It’s okay, I get it. We were devastated over Archie. We handled it in different ways—’

‘It’s more than that—’

‘You’ve got plenty of time to pull the big brother routine on me. Who knows? Maybe I’ll visit Melbourne soon and we can catch up over a few beers? But right now you need to concentrate on getting your life back on track. I know where I’m going. Do you?’

He knew.

He just didn’t know what was scarier: the journey or the destination.

Starr wriggled out of her legwarmers and tossed them next to her tap shoes as her mobile rang.

She hated how her heart danced with expectation as she glanced at the caller ID, only to plummet when she registered Kit.

What kind of masochist wanted to talk to a guy who’d banished her from his life without flinching?

Plopping onto the lumpy sofa, she hit the answer button, wriggling to find a comfortable spot that didn’t involve dodgy sagging, loaded springs. This studio apartment was a godsend, but built for comfort it wasn’t.

‘Hey Kitty-Kat. Long time, no hear.’

‘Are you insane? I called you yesterday.’

As she glanced around the tiny studio apartment—and she used the word
apartment
very loosely—with its
shabby, threadbare chairs, pocked floorboards, dingy one-window lighting and total lack of charm, it seemed like a lifetime since she’d heard from her friend.

Her new job might be fabulous, but her new digs were far from it. Every time she closed her eyes she could envisage the cottage: bright yellow walls, gleaming golden floorboards, comfy cushions piled high on squishy sofas, and she wished she could grab her bags, call a cab and head back to Toorak.

‘How’s the job working out?’

Glancing at the flyer advertising the upcoming season of
Chicago,
she knew things weren’t all bad.

‘It’s great. The cast is talented…’

‘Usual bitchiness?’

‘Yeah, and the girls aren’t too welcoming either.’

Kit’s laughter was as melodious and tuneful as her renowned singing on stage.

‘You’ll be fine. I’ve seen you handle worse.’

The crackling of a chocolate bar being opened tore down the line, followed by loud munching. ‘Speaking of handling anything—heard from Cal-Pal?’

‘As if.’

It had been two days since she’d vacated the cottage and moved in here—forty-eight long, agonising hours during which she had checked her mobile for messages between rehearsals, and glanced at her watch wondering what he was doing, wishing he would arrive on her doorstep and say it had all been some big mistake.

Crazy, because if he did she’d tell him where to
shove his apology, but she hadn’t expected to miss him this much.

Yeah, right, and she’d be starring on Broadway next week.

‘But who cares, right?’

Kit’s
faux
-innocence brought a reluctant smile to her face. While she might not have told her friend everything about her relationship with the commanding CEO, Kit was astute enough to read between the lines.

‘It’s better this way.’

The decibel of Kit’s inelegant snort had her edging the phone away from her ear.

‘Better for whom? This guy has been good for you. After that slime-bag Sergio—’

‘Can we please not mention his name? It gives me hives.’

‘You sounded happy again, really happy, and it couldn’t have been the boring office job, holed up with Mr CEO twenty-four-seven, so that means you two must’ve done the horizontal cha-cha and—’

‘Think I can get a word in here?’

‘Only if you’re lucky.’

Kit’s chuckles warmed her, as they always did. Her friend was one of very few people she trusted. So why the reluctance to confide? Why hold back when she’d blurted every minute detail of her relationship with Sergio?

Deep down, she knew.

How could she vocalise even half of what she was feeling, the depth of her love, when she didn’t want to acknowledge it let alone analyse it?

She missed Callum.

Missed seeing him sleep-tousled and slightly grumpy in the morning before his double-shot espresso.

Missed casting surreptitious peeks at him while he handled a few million dollars like a practised circus juggler.

Missed his rare but brilliant smiles, his frequent praise, his passion in and out of the bedroom…

‘So what really happened between you two?’

Where should she start?

The fact that she hadn’t been able to keep her hands off him from the first week she’d started working for him?

The fact she’d fallen in love with him so quickly her head still spun?

The fact that it would take her a lifetime to get over him?

She couldn’t say any of those things, so she settled for an excuse.

‘I need my space. I found the job I should’ve got in the first place and moved out. Working and living-in became too cosy.’

‘Bull. Cosy’s what you want.’

Starr tensed, her breathing accelerating at Kit’s unsaid words:
some place safe, someone to make you feel safe.

Yes, she wanted that. It was the main reason she’d hung around with Sergio long after the spark in their relationship had died. She wanted that with every breath in her body. But Callum wasn’t the guy she’d thought he was, couldn’t give her what she wanted, and it still hurt. Boy, did it hurt.

‘That job was an interim, you know that.’

‘And Mr CEO? Was he just a stop-gap too? Or should I call him Rebound Guy and be done with it?’

‘He wasn’t a rebound!’

‘My, my, aren’t we defensive?’

Starr rolled her shoulders, kinked her neck from side to side, tried to relax.

She should know Kit by now—know her penchant for winding her up, for teasing the truth out of her by any means. But this time her lips were staying sealed.

‘Kit?’

‘Hmm?’

‘I’ve got to get back to rehearsal.’

Another snort. ‘You’ve made an art form out of running away.’

Staring at the glossy
Chicago
brochure in her hand, she knew she’d made the right career move in leaving Sydney, even if she’d been bolting rather than running from her past.

‘Melbourne suits me. You’d see for yourself if you ever visited.’

‘Three more months, babe, and I’m there.’

‘I’ll hold you to that.’