Kept by the Spanish Billionaire(32)

Rafael murmured something that could have passed for agreement. ‘Oh, I think James knows what a loyal…employee I am,’ he said with a straight face. ‘In fact,’ he continued as they headed outside, straight into the furnace blast of pure New York summer, ‘I told him that we were overrunning on time and he very kindly offered us the use of the company apartment if we wanted to change before going out for a meal tonight…’ Well, today had certainly brought out a side to him he had never before explored. Work, a first for him, had taken a back seat and now he was about to lay the groundwork for seduction. The seduction of a woman who had stated, categorically, that she didn’t find him attractive.#p#分页标题#e#

Rafael was beginning to realise just how simple his love life had previously been. He met women easily, either through friends or more usually in the course of work. Elizabeth he had met over a deal and their shared interests in the vagaries of company law had led to a relationship that had trundled on quite nicely for a while. He had never had to work at a relationship and he had certainly never had to persuade a woman into bed.

But the challenge of unknown territory sent an alien excitement through him. It was something like the thrill he got at the start of a new and complex deal, one that might work or might not, but this excitement had the added edge of sexual conquest, and loathsome though it was for him to view any woman in those terms, he couldn’t help the primitive kick of undiluted adrenaline that was pumping through his body. The unsophisticated concept of the chase and every cavemanlike instinct associated with it was proving to be an irresistible turn-on.

‘What…?’ He realised that he hadn’t heard a word she had been saying to him.

‘I said,’ Amy repeated very slowly, ‘I think we ought to be getting back to the house. It’s…rude for me to abandon the party when everything has been laid on especially. Not especially for me, of course, but for all of us here. Not that I’m not grateful to you for taking my mind off…things…’ what a crazy piece of irony, she thought ‘…but…’

‘But you’re scared…’

Amy froze, hands on hips, and glared at him. ‘Scared of what?’ He had carried on walking. Now he turned around and slowly walked back towards her. Even his economical, graceful movements were peculiarly mesmerising.

‘Of wearing that dress I bought for you…’

Of all the inaccurate things he could have said, that took the biscuit. Amy burst out laughing. ‘I’d love to wear the dress!’ she told him. ‘I never wear dresses. I always wear trousers or skirts. But, believe me, I’m not scared of getting into a dress just because I also happen to wear jeans!’

‘I don’t believe you,’ Rafael said, as cool as a cucumber, one hand holding the assorted bags, the other shoved deep into his trouser pocket. ‘Do you feel you might be out of your depth in a swinging New York restaurant?’

‘Because I’m just a lowly nobody from across the Atlantic?’ Amy snapped, hurt. ‘Isn’t that something like the pot calling the kettle black?’

‘Oh, New York’s my home. And besides, as you pointed out, I have expensive tastes, whatever my profession. Here in New York you’ll find that wearing the right clothes is a passport to pretty much anywhere.’

‘Oh, and you’re really going to fit in wearing jeans or those shorts you’ve got on!’ Unfairly, she thought he probably would.

‘No problem. I’ll buy something decent.’

‘Just like that!’ She snapped her fingers and wondered, not for the first time, about the seemingly limitless stream of money he kept tapping into. She had no dependants either, but she still always seemed to be counting her pennies and trying to work out finances on scraps of paper. Just like that,’ Rafael agreed. He never thought about money. He made vast sums of it and therefore had no need to economise in any way whatsoever. The women he had dated in the past, though not in his league at all, had been substantial earners in their own right. Lengthy debates about the price of a pair of shoes were alien to him. And he had always considered himself by far the more laboriously realistic brother! ‘But before you turned down my offer without hearing me out, the company flat isn’t in use at the moment. I’m not buying you, but it’s getting late. We might just as well grab something here and you can wear your dress. Unless you’d rather get back early and drink your sorrows away over a makeshift roulette table…?’#p#分页标题#e#