Free Flash by Jayne Ann Krentz

going to be all right, but it gave him a terrible scare."
    Olivia hesitated. "What kind of cancer was it?"
    "Basal cell carcinoma. A type of skin cancer." Rose rattled off the diagnosis with the smooth precision of a dermatologist. "Rarely fatal if caught early. But Melwood was badly shaken."
    "The word
cancer
has that effect on people."
    "True. And Melwood is something of a hypochondriac." Rose eyed the closed door again with a foreboding look. "I'm afraid his problems may be only the beginning around here."
    "What do you mean?"
    "There's change in the wind," Rose muttered ominously. "I can feel it."
    "Don't panic," Olivia said crisply. "I'm still here, remember? And I own darn near half the company. I can handle Jasper Sloan."
    "I hope so," Rose said.
    "I've got to run."
    Rose's gaze sharpened. "By the way, I assume you've heard about your cousin Nina? Beth says it looks as if she and Sean Dane are getting very serious."
    Olivia was proud of herself. Her smile did not flicker by so much as a millimeter. "I heard."
    "Life is strange, isn't it?" Rose mused. "Who would have thought that Nina would have fallen in love with Logan Dane's brother?"
    "Go figure. See you later, Aunt Rose." Olivia fled past her and escaped into the relative safety of the hallway.
    What in the world was the matter with her? she wondered as she walked swiftly toward the elevators. It certainly wasn't the gossip concerning her cousin Nina's growing relationship with Sean Dane that had produced this funny hot-cold feeling. She had heard the rumors days ago.
    It was Jasper's invitation to dinner that shook her. She was acting as if he had suggested an affair instead of a working dinner.
    An affair
. Now there was a concept.
    If social dinners with interesting men were rare events in her life, the number of affairs she'd had fell into the vanishingly small category. There had been no serious relationships at all since Logan had died.
    She refused to count those brief months with Crawford Lee Wilder a year and a half ago. That had been a mistake, she thought, but not an affair, thank God. Some sense of intuition had made her resist his slick, polished attempts to get her into bed.
    She was aware that some of her relatives, Aunt Rose, for example, feared that she was secretly carrying a torch for Logan Dane. Olivia knew that was not the case, but she also knew that she did not want to look too closely at the real truth.
    The harsh reality, she thought, was that she had lost her nerve when it came to love. Give her a good, convoluted, complicated business crisis any day. Business she could handle.
    Which was why it was imperative that the problem of Jasper Sloan stay under the heading of business.
    It would be a
working
dinner, she thought Just keep repeating that over and over. A working dinner.
    She came to a halt in front of the elevators and stabbed the button.
    "Hi, Olivia," a cheerful voice called. "How's it hanging?"
    "Hey, Olivia," another voice said a little too loudly. "Come to save Glow from the big bad wolf?"
    Olivia stifled a groan. She turned her head to see her cousins Quincy and Percy ambling toward her down the hall. The twins were attired in their usual jeans, short-sleeved, nerd-pack-equipped sport shirts, and running shoes. They both wore thick-framed glasses. As usual, they had soft drinks and candy bars in their hands. The geek look, they frequently assured her, was trendy.
    "Hi, guys." She glanced at the soda and snacks. "Break time?"
    "You got it." Quincy glanced past her down the hall toward the executive suite. His brows bounced above the frames of his glasses. "So, are the rumors true? Is Sloan really going to fire good old Melwood?"
    "No," Olivia said.
    Percy cast a quick look around and then leaned in close. "What's all this stuff about a merger?"
    "Nothing to it." Olivia stabbed futilely at the stubborn elevator button. "Wish I could hang around and chat, but I'm really busy today."
    "Yeah, sure." Quincy stuffed half a candy bar