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argument.
    “I need some fresh air,” Max’s logical self said with determination, “some exercise, that’s all. It’s just as Dorothea says, ‘a man can’t spend all his time with computers and finances without getting spooky.’
    “She’s a handyman, Maxwell,” he argued. “She probably thinks that you’re some kind of pervert, running around nude, practically undressing her in the elevator.
    “Maybe,” his proper self countered. “But she’s honest, stood right up to you. Not many women do that. And you haven’t been able to get her out of your mind. You almost kissed her. You wanted to kiss her. No, what you wanted to do was make love to her there in the hotel elevator, for heaven’s sake.” He ran on, his feet pounding on the damp sand.
    “An employee, Maxwell, old man,” Max argued, remembering how her brown eyes had sparkled with mischief. “A plumber, and she knew what she was doing. Once she has uniforms that fit, she’ll be—” He stopped cold. He couldn’t even argue logically with himself. Kate was an employee, and the bottom line was that he’d made a rule never to take a personal interest in an employee.
    “Sure, Max, but you know your own rule—take a careful look, examine the potential, and don’t let an opportunity get away from you. What you have to decide is whether Kate is an opportunity or simply a challenge.”
    He started off again, more slowly now that he’d stated his problem logically. If he could only come to a logical decision about how he was going totake a careful look without being burned, he’d be halfway to solving the problem.
    Logic? That was a laugh. For a man who prided himself on keeping a schedule, he’d forgotten all about his plans for the evening after he’d met her. He wasn’t sure that anybody would believe that he’d missed an appointment because of a feisty, brown-eyed maintenance worker.
    He wasn’t sure that he believed it, either.
    There were two other maintenance workers on the day staff. They viewed Kate’s employment with suspicion in the beginning, so she stepped back, allowing them to set the pace. The fact that she repaired the shimmy in the hotel dryer that had stymied her fellow maintenance men was a fact she kept to herself.
    With no pressing duties, Kate volunteered her services to the head housekeeper. As a maid, Kate was quickly accepted. Being a maid was ‘woman’s work,’ and she settled into the routine of stripping the beds, cleaning the rooms, and feeding soiled laundry into the huge washers.
    The monotony of the chores was a blessing, for Kate couldn’t keep her mind from straying back to the man in the penthouse. Never before had her thoughts been so filled by a man. Every time she stepped into the elevator, she found herself secretly hoping that he’d be inside. Every trip held a kind of intense suspense. Would he or wouldn’t he remember his promise of further discussion later? And when was later?
    Shortly after noon there was a lull in activity, and Kate dropped into the employee dining area to have lunch. So far, what she’d done didn’tseem like work, and in spite of her dilemma, she felt a lift in her step that made her hum out loud. Every so often she forced herself to stop and examine her facial expression, fearful that she was grinning foolishly at nothing.
    Kate had finished her seafood salad when the day manager, Helen Stevens, rushed into the dining room with a frantic look on her face.
    “Kate, you need to get changed. I’ve been so busy that I forgot to tell you. You’re to meet Mrs. Jarrett in the garage in half an hour. You’ve been released to her for the remainder of the day and evening, and you have tomorrow off.”
    “But I don’t understand. What about my work?”
    “Kate, you’ve already done more work last night and today than most of the crew does in a week. Besides, if Mrs. Jarrett needs you, everything else can wait.”
    Kate’s protest that she didn’t have anything suitable to