Nothing would. Nothing could. “Give it a shot.”
“Fine,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest in a classic self-defensive posture. “I slept with you because you were gorgeous. Famous. Rich. What girl wouldn’t go to bed with you?”
A fresh spurt of anger shot through him even as he identified the lie in her words. She was too dismissive. Too careless to be telling him any kind of truth. But this lie would serve him as no truth could.
“Good. Then the next month will be easy for you,” he said, at last crossing the room in long, slow strides that had her automatically backing away. “I’m still famous. Still rich. So being with me again won’t be a hardship for you.”
He saw her pale slightly. Then she stiffened her spine and squared her shoulders.
“I’m ready to pay my debt.” She glanced at the bed, then to him. “Now?”
God, yes.
“No.” He enjoyed the flicker of surprise he caught in her eyes. “I’ve already told you, I don’t bargain for sex, Teresa. When we come together again, it will be because you need me. Not because you are paying a bill owed by your family.” She flushed and the color was lovely on her skin.
By the time he was finished with her, she’d be pleading with him to take her. “Your things have been brought here from your suite at the hotel.”
“Here? To your house?”
“Here. To my room,” he corrected. “Our room—for the next month, anyway.”
She stiffened her spine but flattened her lips together to keep from saying whatever was stuck in her throat. Didn’t matter, he told himself. Nothing mattered now. Nothing but finally getting the revenge he’d promised himself so long ago. And still, he had to ask. “One more question.”
“Only one?”
“Were you planning your family’s theft from the beginning?”
“Would it matter if I said no?”
He thought about that for a second or two. “No, because how could I believe a thief?”
She winced and he almost felt guilty—almost.
“Get dressed. We’re going to dinner.”
She frowned and couldn’t stop herself from asking, “Dinner?”
Her surprise told him he had caught her off guard. Good. Now all he had to do was keep her there. “Be ready in an hour.”
* * *
After he left Teresa in his room, Rico stalked down the long hallway leading to the front of the house. He didn’t notice the throw rugs in bright tropical colors or the sunlight glancing in through the front windows to lie on the gleaming tile floor. His mind was too busy, his emotions choking him too completely to be interested in the mundane. Right now all he could think about was the fact that Teresa was back with him. And what that was going to mean.
In long strides, he marched down the long, elegant hallway directly to the library. Once there, he sealed himself inside, walked to his desk and sat down behind it. Snatching up the phone, he hit the speed dial and waited for the connection to be made.
“Hello?”