“Is there something wrong with your food?” Chloe asked. “Should I order something else?”

“No.” He picked up the carafe of coffee. “Maybe this will help.”

He must have seen the longing in Chloe’s eyes, because he filled both mugs.

Chloe decided to get this strange interlude back on a business footing. “May I ask what sort of window dressing you need me to do?”

Trainor picked up his mug. “Your function is to be the guarantor of my integrity.”

“The what?” Chloe put down her fork.

He took a sip of coffee and leaned back in his chair. “This meeting is a favor to a friend. He’s got an associate who’s developed some new software he thinks will change the world of computing. He wants me to bring out his associate’s product under the Trainor Electronics umbrella. You’re here to prove I’m not stealing his idea.”

“How am I going to do that?” She felt as though she’d wandered through the looking glass.

“This is a meeting among friends, so I can’t ask to record it. You’re going to make it clear you’re taking notes. I’ll send him a transcript of your notes for his approval. There will be no question of what products and ideas we discussed, just in case he wants to claim intellectual property theft.”

Stunned, Chloe sat back. This was the flip side of what had happened to her father. In his case he’d worked for a corporation that had laid claim to all his inventions and the enormous profits they’d made from them without compensating him as he deserved. Nathan Trainor was making sure he didn’t get accused of stealing someone else’s ideas. “Have you had a problem with that before?”

“On occasion.” He took another swallow of coffee. He must have seen something unflattering in her expression, because his lips thinned. “I don’t need to steal other people’s ideas. I have one of the best R and D departments in the business.”

How many of his employees’ ideas had he taken as his own, and rewarded them with not a cent above their salaries? She went back to her sandwich. She wasn’t here to right the wrongs of the corporate world. She was just here to tide herself and Grandmillie over until she got another permanent position.

When she glanced back up at Trainor, he was cradling the coffee mug in his hands and gazing out the wall of windows where the sharp verticals of the Manhattan skyline sparkled against the brilliant blue autumn sky like a postcard. With his face turned toward the light, she noticed half circles of fatigue under his eyes. His dark eyebrows were drawn down in a scowl, and his mouth was set in a hard line.

Wanting to soften the bad mood she’d provoked, she pointed to a flat rectangular object enshrined in a Lucite case on the wall. It had loops of wire sticking out at all angles, and rows of metallic boxes marching across its face. It reminded her of some of the odd gadgets her father put together in his home workshop. “Is that modern art?”

He started before turning to follow the direction of her finger. “Not art. Electronics. That is the first Trainor XL battery ever made.”

Chloe dug into her memory for the quick summary Judith had given her when she’d assigned her to work at Trainor Electronics. “Didn’t you make it yourself? When you were really young?”

Surprise was written in his lifted eyebrows. “You know more about the company than most temps. Yes, I created it for my own use in a friend’s garage when I was a teenager.”

“So that’s the battery Trainor Electronics was founded on.” She put down her sandwich and got up to examine the artifact.

“Don’t get too close or you’ll be arrested for industrial espionage.”

Chloe took a giant step away from the battery and tucked her hands behind her back.

“That was a joke. The design secret is inside the casing so you can’t see it,” he said. “Although the battery’s kept in here for security reasons as well as historical interest.”

“So someone could steal it and reverse-engineer it to develop their own superbattery.”

“They could if they wanted to deal with the battalion of patent lawyers we’d unleash on them.” He stood up and walked over to stand beside her, his eyes on the prototype battery. A self-mocking smile turned up the corners of his mouth and carved lines in his cheeks. “Its value is more sentimental than real. It changed the direction of my life.”

He turned his head so their gazes met as he said, “It’s unusual to be able to mark a turning point so clearly.”

Chloe was held in thrall by the emotions roiling in his gray eyes and by the fascinating tilt of his lips. She pivoted back toward the battery because she didn’t want to see the man inside the CEO.

CHAPTER 2

Chloe was typing the meeting notes when a tall brunette in a belted raincoat tried to breeze past her desk.

“May I help you?” Chloe asked in her best you-may-not-bother-the-boss tone.

The woman halted and made an impatient gesture. “Where’s Janice? She knows who I am.”

“Not available,” Chloe said. “May I ask your name?”

“Teresa Fogarty.”

Chloe checked Trainor’s schedule. “I’m sorry. I don’t see your appointment with him.”

The brunette gave her a tight, fake smile. “That’s because it’s a personal visit. We’re having dinner.”

“I’ll let him know you’ve arrived,” Chloe said, pushing the phone’s intercom button as the brunette started to protest. “Mr. Trainor, Ms. Teresa Fogarty is here to see you.”