"Mary Taffs - Hot Fudge and Peppermint" - читать интересную книгу автора (Taffs Mary)

any case."

Her body jerked to full-alert, and he was amused to see her breasts suddenly become well-defined under
her suit jacket. The covered-up look had been her style back then, too. It had made discovering the lush
body underneath that much sweeter. "They let you get away with saying things like that here?" she
demanded. "No wonder I haven't seen more women today."

"They don't have a clue what I say," he said, not completely truthfully. He'd gotten in trouble more than
once over suggestive comments to female employees. "Plus, I'm only telling the truth, Nikolia."

"Nik," she insisted, her teeth clenched. Her given name had embarrassed her when he'd known her
before, and apparently that much hadn't changed.

He smiled. "I like Nikolia. It's pretty - like you." That wasn't a line, despite the fact that her looks
wouldn't win her a second glance from most guys. He'd taken that second glance long ago.

"You can't think -" she started belligerently, but the phone stopped her mid-sentence.

He glanced at the display. "Hello, Ellen. Are you ready for me to bring Nik Harding down?"

"Yes, please," she said in that bitchy tone she used with those she considered her inferiors.

He hung up without responding. It wouldn't hurt her to treat him with half the respect she'd shown
George. His brother had been a jerk, and the fact that he was co-founder of the company shouldn't have
earned him special treatment.

He stood. "We'll continue this later, Nikolia."

He was looking forward to it already.

**

Nik knew the interview was drawing to an end. Mr. Worthington was telling her now that they expected
to make a decision on the job by the middle of next week. Quickly, before he started on the "thanks for
coming in" speech, she spoke up. "Mr. Worthington -"

He interrupted with a warm smile, "Seth, please."

She smiled back at him. "Seth, then. Before we finish, I need to explain about my health. I assure you that
I'm capable of handling this job, but I have a chronic illness that affects me all the time, to one degree or
another." That sounded rather dire, but she couldn't in good conscience make it sound minor. "I have
fibromyalgia."

Concern replaced his smile, but the warmth was still there. "Fibromyalgia is a difficult disease. One of my
wife's friends has it, and she's had quite a time."

"It is difficult, and one of the trickiest parts is that there are no definitive answers on what works or even
what causes it." She took a deep breath and began what she thought of as her sales pitch. "I was
diagnosed two and a half years ago, and one of my first decisions was that I wouldn't let the disease
control me any more than I absolutely had to. I read everything that's published on the subject, and I've