‘Oh…yes…of course.’ Feeling foolish, Perdita dug in her pocket for the business card she had brought with her. ‘I’ve written my personal numbers on the back.’

He took it from her. Was it her imagination, or was he being just as careful as she was to make sure that their fingers didn’t touch? ‘I’ll put it up in kitchen and make sure the kids know about it.’

‘Thanks.’ There was a pause. Empty-handed now, Perdita lifted her arms from her sides and then let them drop again uselessly. ‘Well…thanks.’

‘Thank you for the wine.’

Another moment of awkwardness, then Ed forced a smile. ‘I’ll see you at work, then,’ he said, horribly conscious of the constraint in the atmosphere. ‘I’ve got tomorrow and the weekend to sort things out here, then I’m starting full-time on Monday.’

Work. Yes, remember that, Perdita told herself sternly. That place where he was Chief Executive and she was Operations Manager and there was no time for mooning around over grieving widowers with three children to look after.

‘Of course,’ she said brightly.

‘We’ll need to set up a meeting then.’

‘Right,’ she said. This was terrible. It was obvious that he couldn’t wait for her to go any more than she could wait to be gone, but somehow neither of them seemed to be able to make it happen. ‘Well, I’d better go,’ she said, turning determinedly for the door. ‘Bye.’

Her dignified exit was spoiled when she tripped over the step as she left, but by then Perdita was feeling so awkward she was beyond embarrassment. Maybe it was the wine, she thought as she made her way back to her mother’s house on legs that didn’t seem to be working properly.

Definitely the wine, Perdita decided that weekend. By Monday she had herself well under control and had put the entire silly incident down to a mixture of tiredness and Cabernet Sauvignon, and if she had the odd, shameful frisson whenever she thought about seeing Ed again, she put it down to erratic air-conditioning.

A meeting of all the staff was called for the Monday afternoon so that Ed could address the entire company. He was an engaging speaker, and it was clear that he had made a good impression on everyone from the board members to the cleaners who were included in the meeting. Only Perdita left feeling distinctly aggrieved.

She had assumed that when Ed had talked about setting up a meeting he had meant on Monday, but she had just been part of a crowd, never a feeling that she liked. Perhaps he would try and see her on Tuesday?

But Tuesday came and went, as did Wednesday, and Perdita began to get cross. Didn’t he care about Operations?

In the end, it was Friday before Perdita’s secretary came into her office, bursting with news, and told her that Ed wanted to see her as soon as convenient. ‘Shall I tell his PA you can go now?’

‘No!’ said Perdita instinctively, with just a hint of panic. Having sulked because he didn’t appear to want to see her, she was abruptly flustered at the prospect.

Typical! She had dressed so carefully the last four days in the expectation that she would have a meeting with him, and now, just when she had given up expecting the summons, he had sprung it on her the day she was wearing her old-fashioned hound’s-tooth suit instead of her fabulous cherry-pink jacket with the shawl collar and the flattering cut. She had been so determined to make a good impression.

For professional reasons, of course.

‘You haven’t got any meetings until twelve o’clock,’ Valerie pointed out.

‘Well, no…but I want to get this budget done first,’ said Perdita, with a very fair assumption of casualness.

Why should she jump up and run along to his office the moment Ed snapped his fingers, after all? He had waited this long to see her. Let him wait a bit longer. The last thing she wanted was to look too keen. ‘Ask his PA if she can fit me in some time this afternoon.’

It was all very well not wanting to appear keen, but Perdita hadn’t reckoned with the fact that she would then waste the rest of morning feeling ridiculously nervous at the prospect of seeing Ed again. She did her best to concentrate on her budget-and it did need to be done-but the columns of figures kept wavering in front of her eyes and she would find her mind drifting back to his kitchen and how it had felt to sit opposite him, how he had smiled, how the air had leaked out of her lungs whenever she looked into his eyes or thought about his mouth.

And now she was going to see him again. Perdita’s heart slowed to an uncomfortable thud, which was stupid. She was forty, much too old to be getting into a tizzy about a man. This wasn’t some date. She was meeting her boss this afternoon, that was all. Anyone would think that she was excited, which clearly she wasn’t.

One, because she didn’t believe in mixing personal and professional relationships, and this one was clearly only ever going to be professional anyway.

Two, because he had three children and she was never, ever going to get involved with a single father again.

And three, because she wasn’t particularly attracted to him anyway. He was just a not particularly good-looking, middle-aged man, as she had told Millie. He wasn’t even her type. That strange surge of desire she had felt the other evening was down to the wine and nothing else.

Still, she found herself in the Ladies just before the meeting Valerie had arranged for two o’clock, carefully applying a fresh coat of lipstick. When she had finished, Perdita inspected her reflection carefully. With her dark eyes, bold mouth and hair that swung in a glossy bob to her jaw line, she could take bright colours and dramatic outfits, but this suit was a classic. It had a pencil skirt and a chic jacket over a neat silky top, and Perdita decided on balance that it was probably a better look than the pink jacket currently languishing in the dry cleaners. This outfit might not be as striking, but it made her look cool, businesslike and thoroughly professional.

And not as if her heart were fluttering in her throat, which was all that mattered.

Perdita picked up her file, gave her jacket a final tug into place, took a deep breath and headed along to the Chief Executive’s office.

Ed got to his feet when she went in and at the sight of him the breath promptly whooshed out of Perdita’s lungs, just as it had done when he had appeared at the bottom of the stairs in his hallway. Today, he was wearing a shirt and tie and the formal wear made him seem older and more distant than the work-stained T-shirt and faded jeans.

Perdita was conscious of a rush of quite unfamiliar shyness. At least she thought it was shyness. Whatever it was, it left her with rubbery bones and a strange, quivering feeling beneath her skin.

Ridiculous.

She was Operations Manager of a successful company, Perdita reminded herself sternly. She was an intelligent, confident, capable forty-year-old woman, and she did not do shy or fluttery.

Tilting her chin, she smiled brightly and disguised her weird reaction with a show of briskness. She might feel strange, but she had no intention of letting Ed Merrick guess that it was related to him in any way.

‘Thanks for taking the time to see me,’ she said coolly as he waved her to the comfortable chairs in the corner of his office.

‘Not at all,’ said Ed. ‘I’m glad you could fit me in.’ Was there just the slightest suspicion of sarcasm in his voice? Perdita wondered suspiciously and she fought down a faint flush.

‘It’s a busy time in Operations.’

‘So I gather,’ Ed agreed smoothly. ‘That’s why I left you to last. I’ve seen all the other managers, but I knew that you could be counted on to carry on doing a good job without any interference from me.’

‘Oh.’ Perdita realised that she was sitting nervously on the edge of her chair and tried to relax. Leaning back a little, she crossed her legs, but that made her skirt ride up, exposing rather too much of her legs, so she uncrossed them again. She wished she was wearing trousers, as she would have done with her pink jacket.

Now what was she going to with her legs? Perhaps she could try crossing her ankles like royalty? But when she tried it, that felt all wrong too.

If Ed was irritated by her fidgeting, he didn’t show it. ‘Thank you again for the wine you brought the other day,’ he said formally. ‘It was a very nice thought.’

‘You’re welcome,’ said Perdita with a rather off-putting brightness. ‘It’s easy to be generous with someone else’s wine cellar!’

There was a short pause while Ed wondered how to begin. There had been an inexplicably disturbing awareness between them that night in his kitchen, and he was sure she must have felt it too. It made things a bit awkward now, though. He didn’t want to refer to it, but neither could he pretend that she had never come round.

It was the reason he had put off seeing Perdita until now, although it was also true that she ran an efficient and effective department. Ed had been hoping that either the memory of that awareness would fade-no luck there-or that seeing her at work would change things once more.

Looking at her now, he was only partly reassured. The quiet empathy he had felt sitting at the kitchen table had vanished, and Perdita was back to her peppy, punchy form. On the other hand, now that he had seen her in his home and knew that beneath the pizzazz she could be warm and sympathetic and honest, and had cares and concerns and stresses of her own, it was much harder to think of her as just another business colleague.

Although it was clear that was all she wanted to be. The more vulnerable side of Perdita was tucked firmly away behind a brisk façade of professionalism that Ed was fairly sure was designed to keep him at a distance and demonstrate that if she had been conscious of that unlikely awareness last week, she most certainly didn’t want to be reminded of it.