Socialite's Gamble(16)

‘Yes,’ she’d breathed as if she couldn’t wait.

What a joke. And, unfortunately now that he had worked out exactly what was going on, the joke was on them, not him.

Aidan forced his features to remain impassive but inside fury had strung his muscles tight. Why hadn’t he considered all this before?

Because he hadn’t been able to shift his mind from sex every time he looked at her, that was why.

Well, she’d certainly put paid to that. He wouldn’t touch her now in a New York minute.

Cocking his eyebrow as if in weary amusement he forced an easy laugh. ‘Really?’ he drawled, focusing entirely on Ellery. ‘You’re going to have to do better than that.’ He had Ellery’s head on the chopping block; there was no way he would concede to him now. ‘You can’t meet my bet with a woman.’

‘The rules of the house say that you have to accept any wager I propose, boy,’ Ellery said with cocky self-assurance.

‘Any wager that’s reasonable. Yours is ludicrous. Now find something else.’ Aidan’s tone hardened with every word. ‘Or fold and pray you have a friend whose couch you can sleep on tonight.’ He’d waited a long time to strip this man of everything he owned and nothing but his absolute—and very public—humiliation would suffice to make Aidan feel that his father had finally been avenged for the wrongs perpetrated by his once-good friend.

A piece of weighty jewellery clunked as a woman raised her arm, the sound elevated by the anticipatory stillness in the room.

The old man fidgeted, sweat beading his brow. The background noise from the bar filtered into Aidan’s consciousness. ‘You’re done for, Ellery,’ he said softly. ‘Admit it.’ The moment of victory was so close he could taste it. So why did he feel so tense? Shouldn’t this moment of triumph relieve him of this unbearable burden? Make him feel light? Make him feel happy?

Cara Chatsfield mistakenly chose that moment to step slowly onto the dais, her lovely face a mask of innocent concern. Did she know her lover had just wagered her? Was this something else they’d concocted together outside on the balcony?

Then it struck him. It hadn’t been relief he’d seen on her face when he’d approached her and Ellery before; it had been fear. Fear that they’d nearly been caught out.

Logic told him it wasn’t possible. That it was all too elaborate. But logic wasn’t ruling him right now. Instinct was and his instincts told him something was amiss. That something had been amiss from the moment she had stumbled into him hours earlier.

‘On second thoughts,’ he found himself saying, ‘I’ll take your bet.’

Then he’d take her. So fast and so hard she’d rue the day she’d ever tried to cross him.

Cara knew something wasn’t right as soon as she approached the table.

She hadn’t been near it since she’d returned from outside, Aidan Kelly’s kiss on the terrace crowding her mind. At the time she’d been too mesmerised to pull away. His heat, the sheer maleness of his lean, muscular body so close to hers, the intense way his gaze seemed to eat her up. She’d been so enthralled she hadn’t even tried to ward him off as she would have done any other man she barely knew.

Instead she remembered moaning and then she’d felt the hard thrust of his arousal against her belly. She’d felt dizzy, excited. The danger signals and the loud beating of her heart had drowned out everything other than him. Including common sense!

But could she really meet up with him later on? Could she really go through with it? Have sex with a stranger? A stranger whose car she had ‘borrowed’ …

Or maybe this was fate.

Because how else to explain how right it had felt to be held close in his arms. How else to explain the open hunger she had seen in his face that must have surely been reflected in her own?

So why wouldn’t he look at her now?

Icy fingertips stepped slowly down her spine. Something was wrong, something was very wrong.

She’d sensed it from across the room, in the stillness in the air. It was what had drawn her back to the table. Now she wished she’d run in the other direction.

She noted Martin Ellery’s pallor and Aidan Kelly’s warriorlike expression. Despite the fact that he was slouched back in his chair he looked like a weary despot with a thousand men to back him up.

The woman beside her let out a shaky breath and threw Cara a sympathetic look.

Unsure, Cara smiled at her. ‘What’s going on?’ she murmured. ‘What are they betting on?’

The woman raised both eyebrows and let out a shaky laugh. ‘You.’

‘Me?’ Cara could barely get the word out and her eyes flew to Aidan’s. His expression was thunderous, accusatory—as if this was her fault!