‘OK,’ she confirmed, using her flippers to move away from him in what she hoped was a casual gesture.

He was too close, too overwhelming. It seemed impossible that this was Tom Maddison, that only four days ago they had been in the London office, and he had just been her boss.

He was still just her boss, Imogen reminded herself firmly.

‘OK,’ she said again.

‘Stay close,’ said Tom, pulling down his mask. ‘And don’t touch anything. Just look.’

Imogen nodded, took a breath and replaced the snorkel. She had a momentary panic when she put her face into the water, but then she remembered to breathe as Tom had taught her and the next moment she was floating in the water and looking down at a different world.

Entranced, she drifted along the reef, needing only the occasional gentle movement of the flippers to propel her through the water. It was cooler here, and a lovely deep, dark blue that somehow managed to be clear at the same time so that through the mask she could look right down to the bottom of the lagoon far below. If these were the shallows, how deep was the ocean on the other side of the reef?

Imogen had never seen so many fish before or such vividly coloured creatures. She was a city girl, and in her limited experience British wildlife tended to be brown and grey and black, colours that blended into a drab winter landscape. In comparison, the reef was startlingly bright, with a palatte to rival that of the most colourful of fashion designers. The fish swimming beneath her were coloured in blues, greens, yellows, reds and every shade in between, as if a child had been let loose with a box of crayons. They were extraordinarily patterned too, with bold stripes and pretty speckles and strange splodges in a spectacularly gaudy combination of colours.

She had always imagined that coral would be white and bony, but it, too, came in a bizarre range of colours and shapes as it dropped away into the depths. The sun bounced on the surface of the water, filtering down until it caught shoals of tiny fish, invisible until they flashed in the light. Tom touched her arm and pointed down and Imogen’s eyes widened at the sight of a huge green fish with a ponderous pout that seemed to be lumbering around the coral outcrops in comparison with the smaller fish that flickered around it.

Imogen was enthralled, but acutely aware at the same time of the sound of her breathing, abnormally loud and eerily laboured through the snorkel, of the feel of the T-shirt wafting around her as she drifted, and of Tom’s reassuring presence beside her.

Every now and then a fish would swim up to stare dispassionately into her mask but for the most part they seemed oblivious of the humans hanging in the water above them. There were fish everywhere, swimming along the reef with stately grace, some moving languorously amongst the coral, others darting, drifting, nibbling at tiny plants, flicking busily to and fro. Whole shoals moved as if they were one, accelerating at some unseen signal, and turning together in a shimmer of light.

Absorbed in the magic world beneath her, Imogen was disappointed when Tom touched her arm again and pointed back to the boat but, remembering the deal they had made, she followed him reluctantly.

‘That was fantastic!’ she said as she threw the mask into the boat and clambered awkwardly in after it, too excited by what she had seen to care what she looked like. ‘The fish are amazing. I can’t believe the colours.’

She talked on, squeezing the worst of the wetness from her T-shirt and tipping her head from one side to the other to shake the water out of her ears.

There was a big red mark on her face where the rubber mask had been clamped to her skin, but her eyes were shining and her expression so vivid with delight that Tom felt his throat tighten.

‘We can come out again tomorrow if you like, but you’ve had enough for today,’ he said gruffly. ‘You’d get burnt if you stayed out much longer.’

‘I think you might be right,’ said Imogen reluctantly, twisting her legs round as far as she could. ‘I can already feel the backs of my thighs tingling.’

Tom couldn’t afford to let himself think about her thighs, or about the way that wet T-shirt clung to her body again. He started the motor with an unnecessarily vigorous jerk of the cord and for the umpteenth time reminded himself what he was doing there.

‘We’ve got work to do, too,’ he told Imogen, who was clearly having trouble mustering any enthusiasm at the prospect, although she nodded readily enough.

‘Of course,’ she said in her best PA voice.

Ali had been in while they were out, and the house was beautifully clean and tidy. The fridge was full of wonderful things to eat, and the bed made with crisp, fresh sheets. Imogen wondered if Ali had noticed that the bed was strangely unrumpled for a honeymoon suite.

‘It’s like living in a magic castle where jobs get done before you think of them,’ she said, helping herself to some fruit. ‘I wish I could take Ali home with me.’

‘I don’t suppose he’s checked the stock markets or caught up on all those reports yet,’ said Tom caustically. ‘There are still some jobs we’ll have to do ourselves.’

‘Oh, yes.’ Reminded of what she was supposed to be doing, Imogen licked pineapple juice off her fingers. ‘Is it OK if I have a quick shower first?’

‘Good idea,’ said Tom, who didn’t fancy his chances of concentrating on work if she was sitting there in that wet T-shirt.

It was time to be professional, he decided, opening his laptop a little while later, after he had had a shower of his own. In spite of the heat, he wished he could put on his suit and tie, instead of shorts and a short-sleeved shirt, which was the best he could do for now. He wished he were back in his office in London, in fact, where he was never distracted and where Imogen only ever wore…well, he didn’t know what she wore, but that was the whole point. He never noticed her there at all.

As it was, Imogen had appeared in loose trousers and a sleeveless top. She had done her best to find something appropriate to wear, Tom supposed grudgingly. It wasn’t her fault that her hair was still wet, or that her top only seemed to emphasise the shadow of her cleavage. Or that he couldn’t stop remembering the sheer delight in her face, the smoothness of her skin when he’d steadied her in the boat.

It wasn’t her fault that, for the first time in his life, he didn’t know exactly what he wanted, and being unable to focus on a goal left him feeling restless and faintly uneasy.

They did try. They sat across from each other at the table and began by checking their email, but it was hard to care very much about strategic audits or core competencies or competitor analysis when outside the ocean was murmuring against the reef and the sun was slicing through the fringed leaves of the coconuts. Somewhere a bird called raucously and a tiny, almost colourless gecko ran up the wall and froze as if astounded by the sight of two humans staring silently at their computer screens.

Tom couldn’t understand it. Until now, work had always been his refuge. He was famous for his ability to focus, in fact, but the words on his computer screen were dancing before his eyes, and his attention kept straying to Imogen across the table. Had she always had that little crease between her brows when she studied the screen? That way of tucking her hair behind her ears?

Sensing his gaze, she glanced up and caught him staring at her. ‘Did you want something?’ she asked.

Tom scowled to cover his mortification. ‘We ought to discuss the new acquisitions strategy.’

‘O-kay,’ said Imogen cautiously while she racked her brain to remember what he was talking about. Her mind was full of colourful fish and the sunlight on the sea. She couldn’t even remember what an acquisition was, let alone how you ever had a strategy for it. London and the office seemed to belong to a different world altogether, a world where Tom Maddison was brusque and brisk and besuited, not lean and long-legged and sleekly muscled.

Not the kind of man who could make her heart turn over just by sitting at the helm of a boat with his hair lifting in the breeze from the ocean and his steely eyes turned to silver in the light.

Tom started talking about some new executive vice president while Imogen searched her inbox desperately for the relevant email, until he stopped abruptly.

‘Oh, to hell with it!’ he said, throwing up his hands in a gesture of defeat. ‘It’s too hot to work. Let’s go and swim.’

‘I’ve often wondered how people who live in lovely climates ever get any work done,’ said Imogen a little while later. They were sitting in the tattered shade of a leaning palm and she curled her toes in the soft sand as she looked out over the lagoon. ‘It’s bad enough at home when the sun shines. The moment it comes out, I always feel like turning off my computer and spending the afternoon in the park.’

Tom raised a brow. ‘Nice to know you’ve got such dedication to your work.’

‘I’m only a temp,’ Imogen reminded him, unruffled by his sarcasm. ‘Temps aren’t supposed to be dedicated. It’s different for you. You’re responsible for the whole company. If you get it wrong-or decide you’d rather spend the afternoon in the park-then it’s not just you that’s out of a job. A lot of other people will lose their jobs too.’ She made a face. ‘I’d hate to have that kind of pressure on me, which is why I’ll never have a hugely successful career.’

‘Don’t you have any ambition?’ said Tom, unable to completely conceal his disapproval.

‘Sure I do, but it’s probably not the kind you would recognise. My ambition is to be happy,’ she said simply. Picking up a piece of the dried coconut husk that littered the sand beneath the trees, she twirled it absently between her fingers. ‘To see the world, forget about Andrew and find someone who will love me and who wants to build a life with me.’