“CONGRATULATIONS, JAYNE. You’re going to the ball.”
Jayne Myleston stared at Nick Fontana—her boss and head of Fontana, Inc.—in total disbelief. “I’m what?”
He offered a smile that turned his appearance from austere to an inch off stunning. “You and Jonathan Blair have worked harder for Foundation Fontana than anyone else on my staff and you deserve a reward. I’m well aware that the twenty-five-hundred-dollar price is hefty. So, as my personal thank-you for all your effort, I’m giving you each a ticket to the New Year’s Eve ball.”
She picked up the ticket he’d placed on her desk with due reverence. The wafer-thin metal glittered in her hand, seeming to gather every bit of light in the room and reflect it outward. The laser-etched surface read:
You are cordially invited to a Masked Ball at New York City’s premier hotel, the Centoria Mark, in the Moonlight Ballroom on Friday, December 31, 8:00 p.m. Come as your favorite character, real or imaginary.
“I don’t know what to say,” she murmured before catching herself. Not the most professional comment to make to your boss when he’d just handed you twenty-five-hundred-dollars’ worth of fun. She offered a wide smile. “Other than thank you, of course. I can’t wait to attend.”
“I look forward to seeing you there.”
She studied Nick curiously. She’d never been able to figure him out. One minute he was the hard-driven, take-no-prisoners Boss-with-a-capital-B. And the next he seemed almost approachable. “Have you chosen your costume, yet?” she asked impulsively.
“I thought I’d go as Bill Gates.” He combed his streaked brown hair to one side and perched a pair of half-rim tortoiseshell glasses on his nose.
Jayne struggled to keep a straight face, but couldn’t contain her grin. “No way. You don’t do geeky.”
He whipped off the glasses and pursed his lips, pulling them down slightly at the corners. “Donald Trump?”
“Close, but you have too much hair.”
“Ah. In that case, maybe I’ll just go as myself.”
He tucked away the glasses and ran his hands through his hair in an attempt to return it to normal. But even with the short, crisp style he favored he couldn’t quite control the thick, unruly waves. She’d often thought that women around the world would have given their eyeteeth to have been born with that hair, naturally speared with shafts of sun-bleached golden-white. And here it was wasted on a clueless male. Wasn’t that always the way?
“What about you?” Nick asked. “Any ideas?”
“Not a one,” Jayne admitted cheerfully.
“Well, I know who I’m going as,” Jonathan Blair announced from the doorway. “Zorro. Simple yet elegant, with a touch of dashing.”
Jayne couldn’t quite suppress a sigh. Jonathan would make a wonderful Zorro—tall and broad, with dark brown hair and bitter chocolate eyes. He was one of the handsomest men Jayne had ever met, and she’d had a major crush on him for the eighteen months she’d worked at Fontana, Inc.
Unfortunately, she wasn’t alone. Women buzzed around him as if he were the most fragrant flower in the garden. In fact, the only flower in the garden. And good ol’ Jonathan seemed all too eager to spread his pollen around. Too bad he’d never looked twice at her. Or maybe it was just as well.
“Zorro?” Nick lifted an eyebrow. “I’d have thought Don Juan.”
“I considered it,” Jonathan admitted. “But I like Zorro’s costume better.”
“Easier to get out of?”
Jonathan laughed. “Hey, I’m not that bad. I’m actually a nice guy. Plus, I’m a hard worker.”
“Which is why you’re on my payroll. So, I’ll stop wasting your time and let you both get back to it.” And with that, Nick exited Jayne’s office.
Jonathan waited until they were alone before speaking. “I’ve never been able to get a handle on that guy,” he commented, echoing her thoughts from moments before. “One minute he’s friendly and easygoing and the next he’s Mr. Intimidating.”
“I guess he wouldn’t be where he is today without having an edge.” But secretly, Jayne had to agree. She’d never met anyone more adept at going from charming to steely in the blink of an eye. “It was nice of him to give us tickets to the ball, though.”
Jonathan took a seat on her desk and tugged at a stray honey-blond curl that had escaped the tidy little knot at the nape of her neck. “You’ll have to save me a dance once you figure out your costume.”
“I’ll do that.” She tilted her head to one side. “Who do you suggest I go as?”
“Mary Poppins? Pollyanna?” He snapped his fingers. “I know. Hermione from Harry Potter.”
She struggled to conceal her dismay. Was that how Jonathan really saw her? No wonder he’d never been interested in dating her. “I’ll think about it,” she murmured, then proved his point by tapping her pen against the file he sat on. “Now, if you don’t mind?”
“Right, sorry.” He winked, then slid into a fairly accurate British accent. “Remember to save me that dance, Mary.”
For the rest of the week, Jayne stewed over Jonathan’s comments. On Thursday, the night before the ball, she confronted her best friend and roommate, Courtney. “Is that how I come across to you?” she demanded. She held out her empty wineglass and gave it a little fill-’er-up wave. “Like some sort of intellectual do-gooder nanny?”
Courtney splashed an overly sweet Riesling into Jayne’s glass, followed by her own. “Face it, girl. You go out of your way to draw attention to your brain, rather than your physical attributes. You want people to respect your intellect instead of obsessing over your figure, so you dress down.” She saluted her friend with a grin. “Poor you. I wish I had that problem.”
“I don’t dress down. I dress…” She spared a glance at her tidy gray suit. “Okay, I dress down.”
“Then why act so surprised when Jonathan buys the act?” Courtney lifted a pencil-thin eyebrow. “Or were you hoping he’d see through it? See the real you beneath the boring exterior?”
“Yes,” Jayne admitted. “Is that so terrible?”
Courtney curled up on the couch beside Jayne, drawing her legs underneath her pint-sized body. “Not terrible, just unrealistic, especially when it comes to men.”
“Jonathan is one of the most intelligent men I know.” Jayne reconsidered. “Well, next to Nick Fontana.”
“Mmm. Now there’s some grade A, prime man. And he came by his money the hard way, didn’t he?”
“Absolutely. He started off working for a failing company and arranged a merger with another that was also on the skids. They ended up a single successful entity.” She didn’t bother to disguise her admiration. “After that, he started up Fontana, Inc. and he’s never looked back. He just has a knack for taking differing businesses, putting them together and making something new and successful.”
“Speaking of successful mergers, I wouldn’t mind checking out what he has hidden beneath that Mr. Intimidating exterior.”
“I can tell you.” Courtney’s eyes practically popped out of her head and Jayne grinned. “A Mr. Intimidating interior. And when he’s not busy intimidating people, he’s all business.”
Well…except for those rare occasions when he relaxed enough to be charming. Where most people saw the iconic Nick Fontana, Jayne had discovered a far different person behind the public mask. Charming. Thoughtful. Brilliant. And, from what she’d seen while working on his foundation, incredibly kind.
Courtney’s expression turned mischievous. “Do you suppose he’s all business in the bedroom, too?”
Jayne wrinkled her nose, then buried it in her wineglass. “Please. I don’t need that image stuck in my head.”
Courtney snickered. “He probably does it by the book. You know, ‘Sorry, dear, but we can’t deviate from the proper order of things. Tab A must go into slot B and nowhere else. We shall achieve blastoff in ten, nine, eight…’”
“Don’t!” Jayne begged. “I have to work with the man. How am I supposed to face him Monday morning? Every time I look at him I’ll start a mental countdown.”
“Okay, okay.” Courtney topped off their glasses. “I wonder what sort of woman appeals to him?”
Jayne reclined against the couch cushions and swirled her wine as she considered. “I’m trying to remember some of the women he’s dated. Actually, they’ve all been rather stunning.”
“Brainless or brilliant? His type always goes for one extreme or the other.”
Jayne lifted an eyebrow and shot her roommate a teasing smile. “You seem to know a lot about Fontana’s ‘type.’”
“Used to date someone like him.”
Jayne shook her head, adamant. “There is no one like Nick Fontana.”
“Okay, fair enough. Warren’s bank balance is impressive, but nowhere close to Fontana’s billions. Nor was Warren particularly intimidating.” Courtney grimaced. “In fact, I’d have to say he had clueless geek down pat.”
“As I recall, he also preferred brainless fluff, which you certainly are not.”
“No, I’m not. The awful part about the entire debacle was losing my job after my affair with the boss ended. I sure learned my lesson. Fortunately, my current job is the best one I’ve ever had.” She waved that aside, her wine sloshing precariously close to the rim of her glass. “We’ve gone totally off topic here.”
Jayne sighed. “I don’t even remember the topic anymore.”
“Jonathan—aka Zorro—and your costume for the New Year’s Eve ball.”
Jayne made a face. “Right. That. Maybe I won’t go.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Of course you’ll go. And you’ll stun the pants right off good ol’ Jon.”
Jayne straightened. “Okay. Now I’m intrigued.”
Courtney tilted her head to one side in consideration. “I’m thinking we aim for totally against type.”
“I have a type?”
“You do at work. So here’s what I’ll do for you.” Her expression turned impish. “You turn thirty on New Year’s Day. You know…straight into over-the-hilldom.”
“Gee, thanks,” Jayne said drily. “Don’t forget you’ll be right there with me in six more months.”
“Trust me, I’m all too aware of that fact. So before you start your downward roll, my birthday present to you is a personal transformation for the ball. And just maybe that transformation will serve Jonathan up with a big black Zorro bow.”
It took Jayne a moment to catch her breath enough to reply. “How are you going to pull that off?”
“Honey, when it comes to transformations, you’re talking to an expert,” Courtney retorted without a smidge of false modesty. “As for specifics… We’ll go brunette instead of blond. Exotic instead of sweet. A siren instead of a bookworm.” She leaned forward, stabbing a neon-pink fingernail in Jayne’s direction. “I’ve decided that you’re going as Cleo, queen of the whole damn Nile. And if that doesn’t get Jonathan to jump you, nothing will.”
THE NEXT NIGHT JAYNE STARED at herself in the mirror, not certain whether to be impressed or horrified. “You have got to be kidding me. There is no way I can pull this off.”
Courtney tugged the black wig a fraction of an inch to the left and grinned. “You look incredible.”
“I’m going to freeze to death.”
“Very likely. But you’ll die gorgeous.”
Jayne’s lips twitched. She would, too. The silky black wig turned her skin ivory and made a striking contrast to her light blue eyes. A gold circlet shaped like a cobra held the wig in place. Courtney had pulled out all the stops with the makeup, easy for her considering that for the past two years she’d worked as a makeup artist on a popular New York soap opera. It had also enabled her to bribe wardrobe and get her hands on a spectacular Cleopatra costume. Even better, she’d somehow managed to find that perfect line between sexy and slutty, dramatic and overdone. The end result was positively dazzling.
Jayne shook her head in disbelief. “I don’t know how you do it, girl.”
Courtney beamed. “Not hard when you start the process with such great material. I could tell you stories about some of the actors and actresses I’ve had to work with. Getting them to look even half as good as you is beyond challenging. And if I can’t cover up every flaw—”
“It’s all your fault?” Jayne offered knowingly.
“You got it. Doesn’t matter how God made them—or more often the plastic surgeon. It’s my job to create perfection. With you, I’ve finally achieved it.” She offered Jayne a saucy wink. “So where’s the venue for this pricy bash?”
“The Centoria Mark. Remember I attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the grand opening earlier this year?”
“Right, right. It’s that one with fabulous views of the city and harbor.”
“And the top floor that revolves. That’s where the Moonlight Ballroom is,” Jayne said. “The hotel is the place right now. Even if you could afford a room, you couldn’t get a reservation anytime this decade.”
“Unless you’re Nick Fontana.”
“He does have a way of turning impossible into reality,” Jayne agreed. “And it doesn’t hurt that he’s one of the owners.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Not even a little. Trust me, when it comes to financial acumen, that man is brilliant. He has his fingers in more pies than I can count. And all those pies are solid gold.”
Courtney made a face. “Not terribly tasty, though.”
Jayne grinned. “But profitable and with Fontana that’s what matters most. The bottom line.”
“Too bad he doesn’t have a bit of swash in his buckle. But we’ll see if Cleo can’t snag Zorro, instead.”
Jayne gave herself one final, lingering look. “I don’t see how she can fail.” She gave her roommate an impulsive hug. “Thanks to you.”
“No, sweetie,” Courtney corrected. “Every bit of what’s in that costume is you. Now you just have to live the part.”
“Easier said than done when you’re Hermione at heart,” Jayne murmured.
THE CAB DROPPED JAYNE at the sweeping entrance to the Centoria Mark. The impressive facade gave the immediate impression of grandeur combined with a snazzy avant-garde appearance. It screamed wealth. Status. Trendy. And it took every ounce of her self-possession to exit the cab, slip on the gold-and-silver sequined mask Courtney had created to match the costume and climb the marble steps to the imposing etched glass doors.
A doorman ushered her in with an easy smile. “Fontana party?” he asked.
Jayne returned his smile, relieved by his friendliness. For some reason she’d anticipated he’d be more supercilious. “Is it that obvious?”
“It is, Your Majesty.” He offered the merest hint of a wink. “You want the central elevators. You’ll need to show your ticket to access the Moonlight Ballroom. Enjoy your evening.”
“Thank you.”
Okay, that wasn’t so bad. At least she’d made it through the front door. Tossing back a panel of the cloak covering her costume, she removed her ticket from the small pocket hidden in the ornamental girdle and joined a small group of people waiting for the elevator. Fairy princesses vied with angels. A stocky Louis XVI lavished attention on a dainty Marie Antoinette. Of more interest were Abraham Lincoln and George Washington who were in an intense discussion about whether they dared approach Fontana about an investment opportunity.
Unable to help herself, she waited until they glanced her way and shook her head pointedly. A hushed conversation followed while the two eyed her speculatively. “You sure?” one of them finally asked.
“Positive. Introduce yourselves and then ask if he’d be receptive to a meeting at a more opportune moment, but don’t pitch anything tonight.”
George shot her an appreciative look. “Thanks, Cleo.”
The elevator arrived and they all boarded. The doors parted to reveal an elaborate foyer. On one end was a coat check. In the middle was a set of floor-to-ceiling double doors that opened to the ballroom. A pair of footmen stood on either side of the door, collecting the golden tickets.
Taking a deep breath, she checked her cloak, praying that all the various parts of her costume stayed where they belonged. Although she hadn’t been part of the decoration committee for the charity event, she’d heard enough to expect to be stunned, and when she entered the ballroom she wasn’t disappointed.
The decorations were all in gold, silver and scarlet. To her private amusement, her costume echoed the theme. Garlands of greenery entwined with white fairy lights adorned the railings of the staircase leading into the main ballroom and around the columns supporting the thirty-foot ceiling with its famous overhead moonlight windows. More fairy lights outlined the windows overlooking the cityscape and harbor. High overhead, globes of glittering gold and silver shot shards of sparkling color across the room. They were interspersed with huge balls of red and white roses that scented the air with their sweet perfume.
Tables laden with every imaginable food lined one section of the room. Crystal and silver sparkled, and huge red floral arrangements dotted the snowy linen tablecloth. Enthusiastic partiers swamped a champagne fountain, while molten fountains of white and dark chocolate proved equally popular with the guests. Imported fruit and squares of angel food cake filled glistening crystal bowls, ready to be dipped and consumed. And at the far end of the sweep of tables, in a place of honor, was a giant cake that recreated the New York City skyline and even had edible fireworks bursting above it.
A string quartet played nearby, while the stage awaited the band that would follow them once those in the receiving line were released from bondage. Jayne could just make out Nick’s familiar profile at the head of the line. Her first order of business was to thank her boss for her ticket. Then she’d see if she could find a certain masked Zorro and discover if he found Cleopatra more interesting than plain Jayne.
It took a full thirty minutes to wend her way through the receiving line. Understandable, since most everyone attending the charity ball would probably give their bleached and/or enameled eyeteeth for a chance at some one-on-one time with the legendary Nick Fontana. It reminded her again of how fortunate she was to work for him. She couldn’t help but wonder if he’d recognize her or whether she’d have to clue him in. Regardless, she looked forward to his reaction.
Or so she thought until he took her hand and gave it a quick squeeze. “Welcome, Jayne,” he said with a distracted smile. “I’m glad you could attend.”
“You recognized me, even with my mask and wig.” The words were out before she could prevent them.
His distraction vanished and his hazel eyes honed in on her like golden lasers. “Of course I did. You’re my employee. I’d recognize you anywhere.”
“Oh.” What could she say to that? She noticed that, unlike all the other partiers, he’d dispensed with a mask. “Love your costume, by the way.”
He glanced down at his black tux. “I’m not wearing a costume.”
“Sure you are.” She winked. “I’ll just call you Bond. James Bond.”
He chuckled. “I think I’ll steal your line, if you don’t mind.”
“Feel free, though I think I handed you more of a cliché than a line.”
He lifted an eyebrow, powering up his intimidation factor to full throttle. “You think anyone’s going to call me on it?”
She flashed him a swift grin. “Not a soul.” She hesitated, then went for broke. “I don’t suppose you’ve seen Jonathan?”
Nick’s expression turned distracted again. “Blair? I think he came through the line a while ago.”
“Zorro, right?”
“Was that who he was?”
She’d seen Nick switch off before and recognized it immediately. She was willing to bet he was busily crunching numbers or calculating the interest on his billions or figuring out which company or country to purchase next. “Thanks for inviting me,” she said politely, and moved aside to allow the next supplicant to take her spot.
Jayne spent the hour that followed wandering through the crowd, fending off potential admirers, though a few managed to persuade her onto the dance floor. To her profound relief, her gown behaved, covering all the bits and pieces it was meant to cover. The wig felt a tad warm and the mask made it difficult to see, but all in all she managed.
Other than Jonathan—assuming she could find him—she didn’t know anyone else there. Most of the attendees were gathered in the small, intimate groups they’d come with. There were few, if any, singles wandering around. But then, it was New Year’s Eve. Most people would have brought a date, though the price tag put that option well out of her reach and she couldn’t help but wish that Nick’s invitation had allowed her to bring a guest. Of course, her guest probably would have been Courtney. Just as she was ready to give up on Jonathan and call it a night, someone planted a strong hand around her waist and spun her into his arms.
“Good evening, señorita,” Zorro whispered into her ear, his Spanish accent impressive. “I’m here to claim my dance. In fact, I’m here to claim all of your dances.”