One Night: Exotic Fantasies: One Night in Paradise / Pirate Tycoon, Forbidden Baby / Prince Nadir's Secret Heir. Maisey Yates
stomach tightened. “Not necessarily. But I don’t even have a hope of it as long as I’m working sixty-hour weeks. And since I don’t believe in practical arrangements, like the one you and Hannah have, that will keep me from having a successful relationship.”
“Fine,” he said, the word stiff. “But you stay on until the deal with Amudee is done. Got it? I’ll need you to be around, at the business, my assumed lover, until the ink is dry on the contract.”
It was cold and mercenary. And it was tempting. Tempting to play the part. To immerse herself in it for a while. Just thinking about it made her stomach tighten, made her shiver.
No. You can’t forget. This is just a game to him. More business. “Yes. I won’t let you down. If I say I’m going to do something, I’ll do it.”
“I know.”
“And when it’s over?”
“You can open your bakery. I’ll make sure you’re compensated for your time here.”
Clara stuck out her hand, her heart cracking in her chest. “Then I think we have a deal.”
ZACK was in a fouler mood than he’d been when the double doors of the hotel’s wedding hall had opened to reveal, not his bride, but a very panicked wedding coordinator who was hissing into her headset.
He leaned back in his seat on his private plane and stared at the amber liquid in the tumbler on his tray. Turbulence was bouncing the alcohol around, sending the strong aroma into the air. He wasn’t tempted to take a drink. He didn’t drink, it was just that his flight attendant had heard about the disaster and assumed he might be in need.
He looked across the wide aisle at Clara, who was, sitting on a leather love seat in the living-room-style plane cabin, staring fixedly at her touch-screen phone.
“Good book?” he asked.
Her head snapped up. “How did you know I was reading?”
“Because you always read.”
“Books make better company than surly bosses.”
“Do they make better company than bitchy employees? If so, perhaps I should read more.”
She looked at him, her expression bland. “I wouldn’t know.”
“No. You wouldn’t. Look, I gave you what you asked for.”
“After a big ugly fight.”
“Because I don’t want to lose you.”
A strange expression flashed in her brown eyes. “Right.”
“You’ve been here since the very early days of Roasted, and you’ve been key to the success of the company, of course I don’t want to lose you.”
She looked back down at her phone. “Well, I can’t live my entire life to make you happy.”
He frowned. “That’s not how it’s been, is it?”
“No,” she said, her tone grudging. She put her phone down and stretched her legs out in front of her and her arms straight over her head, back arching, thrusting her breasts forward. His body hardened, his blood rushing through his veins hotter and faster.
That was a direct result of the fact that he was supposed to break his long bout with celibacy tonight, on this very plane, and it wasn’t happening now. Still, his body hadn’t caught up with his mind yet. Damned inconvenient considering he was now fixating on his friend’s breasts. Breasts that he was not supposed to fixate on. Basically two of the only breasts on earth that were off-limits to him.
More inconvenient, considering they were about to spend the week in Chiang Mai in a very secluded and gorgeous honeymoon villa. Even more when you considered that she was leaving the company soon after.
Well, that wasn’t happening. He would make sure of that. He would offer her whatever he had to offer to get her to stay, and until then he would simply nod whenever she brought it up.
He wasn’t sure how he would convince her, only that he would. He’d successfully stolen her away from her bakery job back when he’d only had a handful of coffee shops to his name. He had no doubt he could do an even better job of keeping her now that he had so many resources at his disposal. He could give her whatever she wanted, more freedom, more time off. And she was his friend. She wouldn’t leave him.
She was just mad about the whole fake fiancée thing. But she would get over it. She always did. It wasn’t the first time he’d made her mad. Likely it wouldn’t be the last. But that was just how it was. She wouldn’t really leave him.
He was a master negotiator. And he didn’t lose. He was good at keeping control, of his life and of his business.
“The property we’re staying on is supposed to be amazing. It borders a Chiang Mai, and there’s a spa right on site. It’s more of a resort than anything else, but you have to be invited to stay there by the owner. Very exclusive.” He got nothing but silence in response.
“They have unicorns, I hear,” he continued, “with golden hooves. You’ll love it.”
He heard her try to stifle a very reluctant snicker.
He leaned in and looked at her face, at the faint shadows marring the pale skin beneath her eyes. “Are you tired?” he asked.
She leaned back in the chair. “You have no idea.”
“There’s a bedroom.” His blood jumped in his veins again, like the kick-start on a motorcycle. “You could lay down for a while if you want.”
“How long have we got?”
“Ten more hours.”
“Oh, yeah, I need sleep.” She stood up and did another little stretch move that accentuated her breasts.
Clara needed more than sleep. She needed to get out of the tiny, enclosed space with Zack and all of his hot, male pheromones that were wreaking havoc on her good sense. If she had any at all to wreak havoc on. Well, she did have some. She’d used it to ask for her out.
For a little bit of a chance to move on and forward with her life. Because Zack hadn’t married Hannah today, which was fine and good, but he would marry someone. He’d decided to, and when Zack put his mind to something, he did it. That meant it would happen, sometime in the very near future, she imagined, now that she knew love wasn’t necessarily on the docket. Heck, if he smiled just right at the flight attendant they would probably be engaged by the time they landed in Thailand. And then she could sleep in the guest room in the villa.
She snorted.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“The scariest word known to man when issued from the lips of a woman.”
Her lip curled voluntarily at his statement. “Sexist.”
“I prefer realist, but you’re free to call it as you see it.”
“So tell me this, Zack.”
“What?” he asked, one dark eyebrow arched.
“I assume you’ll attempt marriage again.”
“If I find the right woman.”
“And by that, you don’t mean the woman you love?”
Something in Zack’s posture changed, subtle but obvious to her, his shoulders straightening, his muscles tensing beneath his expertly tailored shirt. His eyes changed, too. There was something dark there, haunted, something she’d never seen before, not this clearly. She’d felt it before, an intensity lurking beneath