Chapter One
Kaleb walked up to his friend Gregory’s assistant’s desk, and he couldn’t help but smile.
For as long as he’d known him, his friend had had the same secretary. She was middle-aged and married with grandchildren but devoted to making Gregory’s life easier. He’d tried several times to steel her away from him, but her loyalty was to Gregory. That wouldn’t make him stop trying to get her.
He just wished he could find someone like her. Nowadays, it was next to impossible to find good people who stuck around for more than a few years. Or if it was a young single, sometimes even a married woman, the flirtations and accidental touches drove him up the wall.
He didn’t like people to touch him except for his close friends or the woman he was sleeping with at the time, and it frustrated him because he hadn’t found a reliable assistant yet.
“Good morning, Mrs. Burns. I’m here to see Gregory.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Spencer, he’s expecting you. Go on in.”
Kaleb glanced down at the file he’d brought in as he walked through the office door, almost colliding with a young woman. She was so tiny, maybe a foot shorter than his own six-foot-three. She would have bounced off of him and landed on the floor if he hadn’t caught her. He grasped her arms to keep her from falling back onto her bottom.
“Whoa, I’m sorry, honey. Did I hurt you?”
She stared up at him. “You look like John Wayne,” she blurted.
Kaleb’s eyebrows rose. John Wayne was even before his time, but he still watched his movies when he had time. “How do you know him?”
“I like old westerns.”
“I do, too,” he said and grinned.
She smiled and waved at Gregory before pulling away from Kaleb.
“Thank you, Aleena,” Gregory called as she walked away.
Kaleb turned and watched her walk off, unable to tear his gaze away from the alluring motion of her hips. She even had a pretty name.
He hadn’t known he was standing there dazed until Gregory cleared his throat.
He turned to see Gregory scowling at him behind his desk.
“Who was that?”
“She’s one of the paralegals.”
“What’s her name?”
“She’s not for you.”
Kaleb’s eyebrows rose again at the hard tone of Gregory’s voice. “How do you know that?”
“She just isn’t.”
Kaleb walked to the desk and sat down, facing his friend. He studied him for a moment. “Does your wife know about her?”
Gregory threw down his pen and scowled. “Jesus Christ, I’m not having an affair with her, and yes, Lana knows her. She babysits for us a lot.”
“Is she seeing someone?”
“Not to my knowledge, but I wasn’t kidding. She’s not in your league.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” Kaleb said, slightly offended.
“She’s a very sweet girl. She’s extremely smart but very naïve and soft-hearted. You’d crush her. She wouldn’t be able to handle being with you, and then it would devastate her when you walked away after having sex with her few times.”
“How in the hell do you know I’d walk away?”
“Because that’s all you do,” Gregory reminded him as he looked over the top of his glasses.
“Only because I haven’t found the right woman.”
Gregory shook his head. “She’s been through enough.”
He studied the older man for a moment. “You’re very protective of her. Why?”
Gregory rubbed his forehead and sighed. “One of her professors who’s a friend of mine told me about her. She was at the top of her class in law school but doesn’t have what it takes to be in the front lines. To stand up in front of people and argue a case or even deal with people on any litigation. She likes being behind the scenes. She’s very good with children, but adults intimidate her.”
“How old is she?”
“Twenty-six.”
“She looks younger.”
“Her professor asked me to hire her. He knew I wouldn’t take advantage of her and would look after her.”
Kaleb’s eyebrows pinched together. “Does she need special attention? Special needs?”
“No, not at all. She just looks at the world through…” Gregory raised his hand in the air and made a circle. “How do I say this … adolescent’s eyes. She’s probably smarter than I am but she trusts everyone and doesn’t have a mean bone in her body.”
“How do you know I’d hurt her?” Kaleb asked, trying to keep the resentment out of his tone.
“Because of your track record.” Gregory ripped his glasses from his face, wiped a hand down his face, stood, and walked over to the door. He closed it and moved back to his chair.
“I had a new attorney about a year ago. Very smart and he seemed nice, but I caught Aleena and him in his office after hours. She was crying. Both were partially undressed. I had warned him to stay away from her but he didn’t listen.”
Anger twisted his stomach. “He raped her?”
“Not exactly. She just thought he was nice to her, and she loved the attention she got from him, but she didn’t realize it was him wanting her like a girlfriend and having sex. She’d been a virgin until then. He didn’t understand why she was so upset and she didn’t understand why he couldn’t just be friends with her.”