Ian had silently cursed his extremely receptive PA for being quite so – receptive. “Yes, I’m aware of that, Andrew. But Tessa is a member of our personal team, and I’m not prepared to lose another of them because of Jason’s harassment. And, to be frank, Tessa is quite a bit younger than the others, and seems to be rather on the naïve side. There’s also the matter of her being married. The last thing I need is to have an irate husband marching in here because one of my employees has been hitting on his wife.”

Andrew had seemed to accept his explanations, or at the very least hadn’t questioned him further as to his motives. Which was a very good thing, Ian thought now, because while all the reasons he’d given Andrew had been valid ones they certainly weren’t the only ones – and definitely not the most important ones. No, the real reason he had pulled out all the stops to keep Jason Baldwin away from Tessa was because of his own attraction to her. There was no possible way he was going to permit anyone to flirt with her, make suggestive comments, or – God forbid – to proposition her. She didn’t belong to him but that didn’t seem to matter in the least when it came to the possessive feelings he had about her. He might never be able to reveal his infatuation with her, but he would do everything within his power to keep her safe.

Ian watched from beneath his lashes as Tessa made her way towards his end of the table, carrying a cup and saucer. The fleeting scent of her light perfume – or possibly just her soap or shampoo – wafted his way as she carefully set the fine china down at his place.

“Your tea, Mr. Gregson,” she murmured in that soft, breathy little voice. She kept her eyes downcast as she spoke, as though she was too intimidated to meet his gaze.

“Thank you, Tessa,” he replied in a rather brisk, impersonal tone. He was determined to keep his reaction to her severely under wraps, never betraying for an instant that he was attracted to her – not to mention incredibly, achingly aroused from having her this close. “I trust that everything is ready for the meeting?”

She raised huge blue eyes to his, the expression in their sapphire depths more than a little terrified. “Yes, sir. The PowerPoint presentation is all set, and the reports and other handouts you asked for are in the packets at each person’s place. Will there be anything else you need, Mr. Gregson?”

Her question was phrased in an entirely professional manner, without even a hint of innuendo or sly suggestiveness, and Ian doubted she would know how to flirt even if she wanted to – unlike some of the others like Alicia, Gina, or Sarah.

He shook his head as he reached for his cup of tea. “There’s nothing else at the moment, no.” He sipped his tea tentatively, his eyes widening in surprise to realize that the beverage was hot, strong, and had just the right amount of sweetness. Despite his resolve to treat Tessa impersonally, he couldn’t help giving her a pleased smile. “I don’t believe I’ve had a cup of properly brewed tea like this since I left England. Thank you, Tessa.”

She blushed furiously, and glanced down at her shoes. “My pleasure, Mr. Gregson,” she replied softly before returning to her seat at the back of the room.

‘Yes, darling’ he thought to himself as he continued to watch her unobserved. ‘It would most definitely be your pleasure if you belonged to me. I would pleasure you for hours at a time, and in ways you could never imagine.’

But before he could begin to fantasize about all the many ways he would give his golden-haired beauty the utmost in bliss, the meeting began and Ian forced himself to divert his attention to the business at hand. Tessa remained quietly in the background, taking diligent notes and then starting up the PowerPoint presentation at the appropriate time. He couldn’t resist, however, making frequent but discreet glances in her direction over the course of the meeting, always being exceedingly careful that no one else in the room observed his interest – especially Tessa herself.

She was not the sort of woman who fussed, he noticed, either with her appearance or her mannerisms. She was subdued and rather introverted, and didn’t even attempt to make eye contact or converse with any of the other employees present. He appreciated her professionalism and dedication to her work, and knew that he had Mrs. C. to thank for the rigid training she had undoubtedly put Tessa through. Tessa was a model employee, and if it hadn’t been for his unwilling attraction to her he would very likely be working more closely with her on various projects – rather than relying on Andrew to delegate out the assignments. He simply couldn’t take the risk that he might betray his infatuation with her, an infatuation that was forbidden for too many reasons.

Ian had been furious with himself at not being able to firmly put the young, innocent, and very married blonde out of his head over the past few weeks. He’d been acting like some moonstruck adolescent schoolboy with an unrequited crush on the prettiest girl in his class. And Ian Gregson simply did not have crushes, or pine for a woman, and he most certainly did not permit a shy, naïve office assistant to unwillingly occupy his thoughts. Even if she hadn’t been married – an inescapable fact that in itself was more than enough reason to keep his distance – Tessa worked for him, and there was no possible way he would violate the very strict company policy prohibiting such a relationship. She was also far too young for him – fifteen years, he’d calculated – and Ian could just imagine the good-natured ribbing he would receive from friends and family for “robbing the cradle”.

He was a man used to being in control of every aspect of his life, and it annoyed him to no end that for once he didn’t seem capable of controlling his reaction to this – this – girl. She was barely older than a teenager, for God’s sake, and with her wide-eyed stares, her tendency to blush furiously at any given moment, and her shy, introverted manner, she reminded him of a skittish fawn. Definitely not the sort of woman he had dated in the past, he thought drolly, as he briefly compared Tessa to Davina, his former fiancé. For all of Davina’s perfect manners, ladylike behavior, and posh education, there had been nothing the least bit shy or uncertain about her. She’d been extremely confident, completely sophisticated, and very much at home at social functions.

That was the sort of woman he ought to be dating, he’d scolded himself on more than one occasion as of late – one who was refined, sophisticated, and socially adept. In fact, in an all-out effort to stop daydreaming about a certain blushing blonde, Ian had gone out with several different women over the past weeks, going so far as to permit some friends of his to set him up with a date – something he never allowed under normal circumstances.