“And I’ve also listed….”
Lincoln tossed his helmet and leather gloves onto the chair by the door, then turned to look at Ms. Kinsley McCabe, wondering what had caused her sudden silence.
He barely swallowed a laugh when he watched her wide, blue eyes moving over the numerous tables piled high with - what a casual observer might assume - was chaos. But each worktable held the parts for each of the projects he was currently working on.
“I just…” she stammered, scanning the tables again. Then she seemed to pull herself together, folded her pretty hands with the pink nails together over her stomach and nodded firmly. “Yes!” She declared aloud.
“Yes?” he prompted, not sure what she was confirming.
She looked up at him, an adorably determined expression on her face. “Yes. I can organize this for you!”
He couldn’t help it. Lincoln burst out laughing, shaking his head as he walked down the center of the row of tables. “Don’t touch anything on my work benches. Everything you see here is a work in progress.”
“Yes, but…”
He stopped, but she didn’t notice since she was still taking in the space, so she literally ran into him. Damn, she was soft! Soft and curvy and those big, blue eyes blinked up at him with confusion.
“This?” she whispered, obviously horrified. “This is organized to you?” She waved vaguely, encompassing the room.
“Absolutely,” he replied. He continued down the aisle towards the back, where his office was located. Once inside, he sat down at his desk, waving her into the chair opposite.
“Thank you.” She perched on the edge of the chair and Lincoln smiled slightly.
“So, tell me about yourself.”
She shifted slightly. “I’ve already given you a brief summary of my skills. I’m also…”
“No,” he interrupted. “It will be just me and you in this warehouse most days. I have a staff, but they don’t work here most of the time. Only when we’re launching a product will you see them here. So tell me about you, Ms. McCabe. Working in close quarters with someone means that we will get to know each other very well.”
Those sky blue eyes were shockingly beautiful, he thought. And those lips once again pressed into adorable disapproval.
She took a deep breath and his eyes moved lower, glancing at her stiff, white shirt. He couldn’t determine what was underneath, and couldn’t help wondering. Something soft, he thought. Soft and adorably sexy.
“Well, I’m twenty-eight years old, but you already knew that.”
He didn’t actually. But Lincoln didn’t comment on her age. Most people had dismissed him when he’d come up with his first patent at the age of nineteen. That invention, a new carburetor that increased fuel efficiency in cars by about seven point eight percent and with an additional cost to each vehicle of only three dollars, had made him more than half a million dollars in the first year. Nobody dismissed his next invention, a small cylinder that increased the stability of cars, improving safety, when he’d announced it at the age of twenty. Fifteen years later, at thirty-five, Lincoln had about forty patents to his name and more money than he could spend in several lifetimes. So in his mind, age was just a number. It was a point in time, not an indication of experience or wisdom.
“Your requirements mentioned that you’re looking for someone who can potentially work long hours. I don’t have children, yet, but I’m engaged to be engaged. I don’t know if that would be a problem.”
Lincoln ignored the stab of…whatever…that he felt at that announcement. So she was engaged…well, engaged to be engaged. He had no idea what that meant. Lincoln wasn’t in the market for a wife, so a married assistant would actually be a benefit.
“My boyfriend, Carl, works as a programmer. So, we’re perfectly suited for each other.”
Lincoln had obviously missed a lot since he had no idea why this adorable creature was “perfectly suited” to a programmer. They’d probably have one point nine four children with plastic pocket protectors in their shirt pockets. More power to them, he thought, shifting in his chair.
“Do you like to travel?”
“Oh yes!” she gasped, then realized that her response might have been a bit too enthusiastic. “I mean, yes. I enjoy traveling. I don’t get to do much of it because of work. But I was told by the agency that travel would be part of this job and I’m fully on board.”
“Your fiancé won’t mind you being gone?”
A pretty blush stole up Ms. McCabe’s cheeks as she shook her head. “No. Absolutely not. Carl and I have discussed this. He doesn’t like to travel. At all,” she said and Lincoln detected an odd tone to her words. “So, he enthusiastically encouraged me to apply for this job. He said that this sort of opportunity would allow me to travel and he wouldn’t have to accompany me.” She shrugged, but Lincoln didn’t think that the gesture was dismissive so much as…accepting. An interesting reaction, he thought.
Leaning back in his leather chair, he toyed with the baseball on his desk. “Where would you travel if you could go anywhere?”
She laughed delightedly as the stiffness in her shoulders began to ease. “Oh my!” She glanced up at the ceiling. “Anywhere! I’ve lived in Washington State all my life. I’ve never even been across the border to Oregon or Idaho, much less into Canada.” She sighed and Lincoln took that to mean…well, he wasn’t sure what that sigh meant. Not yet. “With after school jobs and college and…” she shrugged absently, “I worked very long hours for my previous employers, so there wasn’t much opportunity to travel.” She looked horrified and leaned forward, holding out one of her hands. “Not that I mind the long hours!” she told him. “I mean,
