Dance for the Billionaire(31)

What else could she say? He clearly didn’t want her gratitude. How she could make him understand that she wasn’t expecting marriage, that she would accept whatever time he had to give her, as long as it was exclusive time—she won’t share him with another woman. If he dropped her tomorrow she would be devastated, but she prayed she would be able to move on, taking precious memories of their time together with her. Trying to hold on to a man like Dominic would be like trying to keep hold of an eel.

“I think you need to meet my mother.”

“What?” Hadn’t he heard a word she’d said about keeping things just between the two of them?

“It’s time you knew a little more about me.”

“I don’t need your mother to tell me how wonderful you are. I know that already!”

“I’ll call her and arrange for the two of you to meet for lunch.”

“Dominic I don’t want to meet your mother! We’re not even dating.”

“Aren’t we?”

“We’re having sex.” He gave her a stony-eyed glare and she hastily amended, “Great sex, though.”

“You can tell that to my mother. I’m sure she’ll be pleased to hear it.”

“Are you seriously ordering me to meet your mother?”

“She helped my father get the company off its feet in the beginning, so she’s as much a part of it as he is. I’m giving you an instruction,” he informed her coolly.

“Fine.” She pulled away from him and hurriedly exited the flat.

This is why you never sleep with your damn boss!

The conversation really hadn’t gone as she’d planned. It was hard to explain what she felt without sounding prejudiced. She’d never wanted to be anything but black. Her Jamaican roots were strong. She didn’t want to change who she was just to date a person of another race. She liked her kinky hair, she liked her big hips, her chunky thighs and full behind. She loved Jamaican food and music. She loved talking Patois, or listening to other people talk it among themselves, on mobile phones while walking past her, or at a bus stop, or on a bus. She loved the fleeting reminders of her parents’ birthplace, which she still remembered vividly from her visits there.

Though, she was ashamed to admit it, but she almost always did a double take when she saw the fairly rare sight of a black woman with a white man. She always wondered what was in it for him, or for her. If the guy was much older she always thought he had to be loaded; if he was young or good looking, she wondered if he needed a visa to stay in the UK, or if the woman had money. Her first thought was never that they simply loved each other.#p#分页标题#e#

The seven year difference in their ages was ideal—she needed someone just a bit older to put her in her place from time to time. She would walk all over a younger man. But anyone seeing her and Dominic together would assume that she was after his money. She cringed at the thought, but acknowledged that she deserved the payback for herself thinking the same thing of other black women in a similar position.

Dominic’s money had little to do with her feelings for him. Yet, there was no ignoring the fact that he was loaded. She would have been attracted to him, even if he was a postman or a street cleaner. The question that she couldn’t honestly answer was: would she have slept with him if he was? His money gave him an aura of power that was seductive. He had also, with a sum that was peanuts to him, drastically improved her financial position and given her the first months of security she’d had since the age of eleven. And yet, if he wasn’t rich she would worry less that she was just a plaything he would discard when he was done toying with her.

Never say never. She was thankful that she hadn’t ever vocalized the private thought that she would never date a white man. She’d had typical teenage crushes on black actors, singers and rappers; had been attracted to black boys while at secondary school and had seen a few on the university campus who had made her heartbeat quicken. But one casual date at Pizza Hut with a fellow student had made her realize that real romance could far removed from its portrayal in novels. Her date had ordered a large pizza for himself and a bottle of wine to accompany the meal, and another as they chatted afterwards. She had barely drunk any, not being used to it or liking its dry, crisp taste, but had enjoyed her small Margherita. When the bill was presented, she was horrified to learn that although he had invited her on the date, he’d expected her to pay half the bill. Luckily, she’d had the required amount in her purse, but it had severely eaten into the amount she’d set aside for that month’s groceries. In the weeks following her siblings hadn’t noticed that their portions of meat, chicken or fish were smaller than usual, or that often there weren’t enough pieces for their sister to have a share as well. It had taken several weeks of scrimping and scraping to financially recover from the one lousy date. She’d decided that they weren’t worth the effort—at least not until she was in a better economic position.