Her lips slowly curved and he realized he was still grinning like a demented person. Well, so what. He was allowed to have a positive emotion, at least once a week. As long as no one else saw. The matchmaker hardly counted. Only, she did look awfully nice in his chair.

Of course, it was a great chair. The windows looked out over the pool and the manicured garden. There was a freaking gazebo in the background. The sun was perfect and summery. She had worn a nice dress-thing. Anyway, that was probably the niceness.

Not the memory of holding her pressed against him while the sounds of her sister’s guitar floated past.

That was nice in a cringe-y sort of way. Like the hung-over memories of a party that was fun until the host found you in the coatroom with his girlfriend. Actually, it was the girlfriend that had spoiled that one. All that buildup, and she was pretty blah in bed. In coat?

He digressed.

He was still grinning at Drea. This was getting uncomfortable. “Do you need anything?” That should cover it.

“Thanks, but I’m fine observing.”

And what exactly was she observing? Blake considered demanding her notebook to review but immediately decided she would fight him. Perhaps she’d use the restroom and he could peek at it then. He should refill her drink. It wasn’t even lunchtime, though, and forcing scotch on an employee, even an annoying one, even when it was really good scotch, was still bad form before noon.

She was still staring at him. Okay, perhaps she was in love with him. He had been told he was an excellent kisser.

“Blake, we have to find a way to make you look less arrogant.”

Oh. Maybe not love, then.

He straightened his collar. It was a Saturday so he’d gone sans tie, leaving the top button of his dress shirt undone. He’d given himself a good glance in the mirror before she’d arrived, and had been pleased with his appearance. “I look good, thank you.”

“No, you don’t. I mean, you literally look good.” Her eyes clouded momentarily. “Really good.” Then she shook her head. “I mean, you know, or whatever.”

Finally, he’d flustered her. Fun.

She placed a hand on her forehead, eyes closed. “It isn’t your physical presence that is the issue, Blake.” Her lids popped open, her gaze missing the fog from a moment before. “It’s your general attitude that I’m troubled by. It doesn’t matter how dumb, submissive, and bland a girl I find for you—you are scary. I think I can make you a human. Or—maybe that’s harsh?”

It was harsh.

She blew out a stream of air. “I’ll think more on it.” She rummaged in her bag and pulled out an iPad mini. “Meanwhile, what’s your Internet password? I need to get online.”

He returned his focus to his computer screen and, without thinking, answered, “PinballWizard. Capital P, capital W, no spaces.”

He felt her eyes on him, heavy and questioning.

“What?” Her expression was incredulous. “PinballWizard?”

Dammit. He should have offered to enter it in for her. “Yes. It was set up by someone else. My IT guy.” That didn’t sound like fumbling, did it?

Andy kept her gaze pinned on him. “You are an IT guy. You have someone else handle your IT?”

He brought his hand up to fiddle with his tie before remembering he wasn’t wearing one. “Yes. Is that not okay with you?”

She shrugged. “Just strikes me as unusual. I guess I never thought about it.”

He really did have an IT guy. He had the know-how to set up the White House with a secure Internet system; it was a poor use of his time to set up his own. The password, though, had been his decision. No need to share that with nosy Andrea Dawson. “Is that all then?”

“I’m connected to the Internet, so yes. Thank you.”

Blake watched her for a few minutes as she scrolled through pages on her iPad. Then, with a bit of effort, he refocused on the matters at hand. Another IT company was trying to underbid him for a couple of contracts. The text he had allowed himself happiness over had involved his personal detective finding some discrepancies in the accounting of his rival. Time to deal with them.

He wrote a strongly worded email to the CEO of the other firm, and allowed himself another grin at its completion. One more problem off his plate. Then there was the small matter of an employee of his that he suspected of spying for the other company. Although Massachusetts was an at-will state, he felt certain the guy would fight a termination. Besides, anyone who committed treason against his company was not going to get unemployment under his watch. Surely they could come to some sort of solution. Blake began to review his employee files.

The office phone rang. A board member was planning to resign. Blake dropped everything for half an hour until he determined that it truly was for personal reasons, and nothing indicative of problems in the board. Emails rolled in, questions were answered, scotch was refilled as a quiet celebration when the other CEO withdrew his bids.

“Blake?”

Drea’s voice knocked him out of his work mode. He’d actually forgotten she was there again. Odd that he was so comfortable in her presence. “Yes?” He glanced at his watch. “Oh, is it lunchtime?”

She shook her head, her auburn hair catching the light in a way that was quite mesmerizing. “It’s a little early still for me. I wanted to go over some things with you, if you don’t mind. When you have a few minutes.”

He blinked, shifting his gaze from her locks to her eyes. She’d asked him something … what was it? Oh, yes. “Certainly. Now is fine.”

Her face lit up. “Great.” She stood and crossed to him, iPad in hand. “I put together some pictures of things I think we could do to warm up the house.” She set the tablet on the desk in front of him and pointed to the screen. “Here. I made a folder in Pinterest and pinned some things that could work.”

“Pinterest?” Whatever the application was, it was easy to use. He was already flipping through pictures of expensive houses such as his. The shots Drea had chosen were specific—close-ups of square couch pillows, lamps, rugs, several wall hangings.

Her voice fell over his shoulder. “Pinterest is social media for sharing pictures. Sort of a virtual corkboard. Don’t worry, it doesn’t have your name attached anywhere.”

He nodded, pleased that his new hire actually did have social media skills. Continuing to scroll through the images he noted that she also had good taste. His designer could have used these suggestions, though Blake had been adamant about what he wanted at the time. If his expert had even tried to show him these items, he would have refused to look. Perhaps he’d been a little too obstinate.

When he reached the bottom of the page, he clicked a button at the top that said ANDY D. This took him to a set of folders, two of which said BLAKE DONOVAN. The first seemed to contain the images he’d just seen. The other … He clicked on it to find several pictures of beautiful women with near-black hair and slight body frames.

He clicked on one of the more attractive girls, a gorgeous young woman with a sparkling smile and Asian features. “You want to put this in my living room? That certainly would warm the place up.”

Drea leaned closer, peering over his shoulder. “Oh, that’s the other board I want to show you.” She reached over and clicked the screen back to the full page of images. “I’m aware of your personality preferences, but I want to make sure I understand what you’re looking for physically. I found some pictures of models and actresses that I thought you might find attractive. If you could just tell me if I’m on the right track.”

Her hair swung to tickle against his cheek, and he caught her pleasant scent of perfume mixed with apple blossoms. Must be her shampoo.

He had to remind himself to move his eyes back to the tablet instead of letting them drift to the woman leaning over him.