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Sure, you’ve been here, what, three days? I bet you already have someone on the hook. Where’d you meet her?”
    â€œWatch the ball game,” Dylan replied.
    Neal gave him a reproachful look. “I can follow more than one sport at a time. Come on, tell.”
    Dylan wasn’t sure what there was to tell. He was working a tricky project on a tight timeline that threatened to shrink without warning. And success was mandatory. He had no business getting distracted by the very delicious Max McBain. But there was more to her than just her looks, he’d known that within the first five minutes. There was intelligence,stubbornness, ambition and that underlying challenge that he found downright irresistible.
    A smart man would let her be, and Dylan considered himself a smart man. But he’d always been good at multitasking. No reason he couldn’t build a winning proposal and still give Max McBain the time and attention she deserved.
    Because she was definitely a woman who deserved attention.

Chapter Four
    â€œW hen Hal said you could make rain, I don’t think this was what he had in mind.” Max turned toward Dylan from the window, where an unexpected summer thunderstorm pounded the glass. They stood in his office, once Jeremy’s. It appeared Max’s hopes of getting a window of her own were on hold.
    Along with so much else.
    Patience, she reminded herself. Granted, she’d found herself right back in the same situation she’d been in so many times over the years. But she’d learned to manage it. Being the power behind the throne wasn’t the same as being on the throne, but she’d discovered that, with a few well-practiced tricks, it was power nonetheless. It wouldn’t takemuch time to figure which tricks would work on Dylan Reynolds; in fact it seemed pretty obvious. She’d done it before. There was no reason to expect that it would be any different this time.
    Oh yes there was.
    Max ignored the mocking little voice in her head, the same way she’d ignored the little shiver that had run through her in the elevator. He’d just been trying to get a rise out of her. She wasn’t about to let him succeed. The surprises were over with. From now on, she was the one in control.
    She rolled a chair over from the glossy white worktable on the other side of the office to the desk with its computer. She sat, hand hovering over the mouse. “May I?” At his nod, she tapped a few keystrokes and opened up the file tree. “I put everything about the project on the company common drive—the request for proposals, the schedule, history, preliminary designs, notes. You can find it all here.”
    His footsteps sounded on the floor as he walked up behind her to look at the computer monitor, resting one hand on the back of her chair. The hairs on the nape of her neck prickled in awareness. Whether or not it was her imagination, she swore she could feel the heat of his body. She knew she could hear the sound of his breath. When he reached down to take the mouse, she took care to move her hand away. Not cowardice, Max told herself, just prudence. Out of the corner of her eye, she thought she saw a faint twitch at the corner of his mouth.
    She set her jaw. “I think you already know the basics,” she said crisply. “Portland General invited three firms, including BRS, to submit proposals for a sixty-thousand-square-foot addition to the main building. The request for proposal specifies patient rooms, treatment rooms, an infusion center, an outpatient surgical center, radiology, lab, offices, the whole deal. The new wing will connect to the structure at the location of the current main entrance, so we’ve got to build them a new one.”
    â€œAnd we’ve got three weeks until the deadline?”
    â€œFourteen days, actually. The Friday after next.”
    â€œSeventeen days.” He dropped into the chair next her.