Chapter Three #3
She didn’t need to look at him to feel his annoyance. It radiated from him like a fire radiating heat, and that made her feel unreasonably satisfied.
Weren’t you not going to keep bickering with him?
That was the idea. But he was being such a dick she couldn’t help herself.
‘If you’re going to put me to the trouble of getting a security guard to escort you, then I’m going to put you to the trouble of dressing for the occasion,’ he said at last.
Zoe went still, then jerked her head up to meet his steady gaze. ‘Dress? What do you mean dress?’
‘It’ll be our wedding dinner.’ Challenge glinted in his eyes. ‘So I think we should dress accordingly.’
Immediately, she wanted to tell him to go to hell, but she could see he was expecting her to say that. So of course she had to do the opposite. It went against her every instinct but she gave him a saccharine smile instead.
‘I’d love to dress up. But unfortunately, I didn’t bring a nice dress.’
‘That won’t be a problem,’ he said with the same calm. ‘I’m sure I can find you something appropriate.’
‘You have a lot of women’s dresses in your wonderful Greek villa then?’
‘I do,’ he agreed. ‘I do quite a bit of entertaining there.’
‘Entertaining your thousands of mistresses?’
Again, that irritatingly sexy half smile curled one corner of his mouth.
‘How do you know that I have thousands of mistresses?’
A little jolt went through her, and she cursed herself silently.
She hadn’t been able to help reading about him in various business publications and online gossip columns.
And while his mistresses might not number in the thousands, they definitely numbered in the hundreds, she was sure.
He did have somewhat of a playboy reputation.
‘It was an assumption,’ she said, trying to cover her mistake. ‘Billionaires aren’t generally known for their commitment to celibacy.’
He laughed and something shivered through her, because that laugh was as sexy as that smile.
In fact, it was downright illegally so. She didn’t like, either, that a small part of her was pleased with herself for getting one out of him.
She’d used to love hearing him laugh. He’d never been free with them but she’d always managed to get one out of him, and the sound had never failed to make her happy too.
‘That’s true,’ he admitted. ‘But rest assured, my list of conquests is not in the thousands.’
‘What a relief,’ she said sarcastically. ‘You had me worried there for a minute.’
‘Why?’ One lazy brow rose. ‘Thinking of adding yourself to the list?’
Right on cue, she could again feel the blush spread over her cheeks. Not for the first time, she wished she wasn’t quite so pale.
‘I’d rather die,’ she said, unable to keep the edge from her voice.
‘I’m sure you wouldn’t.’ He was still smiling, no doubt satisfied that he’d got a rise out of her. ‘There are worse things than being in my bed.’
Zoe fiercely wished he would stop saying words like ‘bed’ and ‘mistresses’. She wished her own brain wouldn’t immediately take the word ‘bed’ and run with it, thinking about what it would be like to be one of his mistresses, to be in his bed.
‘Do you mind?’ She glanced down at her laptop screen once more. ‘I’m trying to work.’
‘You were the one who mentioned conception and mistresses, not me.’
Zoe gritted her teeth and ignored him.
‘I have some gowns for you to choose from,’ he went on. ‘I’ll have my housekeeper lay out a selection for you.’
Of course, he had a housekeeper. He wasn’t the poor orphan she’d come to know and love in Banks’s house. The driven, distractible boy who had nothing, like all the others in that house, but it didn’t matter because they were all in it together.
No, he was a big deal now. He owned Ares Security, whose online security systems were supposedly impregnable, and he was worth billions of dollars.
She’d read that he had houses everywhere and never stayed in the same place more than a week.
Which was the only thing that made the thought of living in Greece supportable.
He’d only be there a week and then he’d be gone.
She’d been a bit worried about leaving Banks on his own, but Banks had insisted he’d be fine, that she shouldn’t be concerned about him.
So maybe instead of worrying, she should do something really useful while she was there.
Maybe she could work on hacking Ares’ security systems, just for fun.
There was always a weakness, always a back door, and she, like Archimedes, was very, very good at finding it, even if the system was supposedly ‘impregnable’.
That would wipe that smug smile off his face.
After all, the Titanic was supposed to be ‘unsinkable’.
‘I’ll find some jewellery for you,’ Archimedes went on, clearly warming to his theme. ‘Also, lipstick if you please. Shoes too.’
He was goading her now, and she shouldn’t rise to the bait, she really shouldn’t.
‘How about you stick that jewellery, lipstick and shoes up your arse?’ she snapped back, unable to help herself.
Archimedes only laughed again. ‘This is going to be a very interesting dinner.’