She smiled at him, proud of how far Jared had come at being brutally honest about everything in his life. “I know you will.”
“I wonder how Randi took the news that Evan was her secret email buddy. Did she say?” Jared was curious.
“She didn’t mention it,” Mara answered thoughtfully, wondering herself how Randi had felt when she found out that she’d been talking to Evan all this time. “I’m sure she was shocked. Hope mentioned that they’d been anonymous friends for over a year, but Randi thought it was an employee of the Sinclair Fund.”
“Would it matter to her?” Jared queried, his expression concerned. “Do you think she’d be pissed?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t know exactly how they related to each other, but she won’t be happy that he lied all this time.”
“He said he didn’t exactly lie. He just didn’t correct her whenever she mentioned him being an employee of our fund.” He hesitated before adding, “And he might have acknowledged it as the truth once or twice.”
Mara gave Jared an admonishing look. “He lied.”
“They agreed not to share identities,” Jared argued.
“He’s Evan Sinclair. He could have told her the truth once they got to know each other. I doubt that Randi blatantly lied to him.”
“It’s over. She knows now, and she’s obviously forgiven him,” Jared said confidently. “Hope told him to come clean and see what happened from that point on.”
Mara nodded. “I hope everything goes okay tonight. I hope I’m dressed okay. The party didn’t start out to be formal, but once Hope started calling it a ball, everyone seemed to think they needed to dress for a fancy do.” Her sister-in-law was still calling it a come-as-you-are event, but she knew the attendees were excited to put on their best dress and have a good time. “The ballroom looks beautiful. We all stopped to do a last-minute check before we came home.”
Jared pulled her closer. “You look beautiful, Mara. Can’t you tell?”
She shuddered as his rock-hard erection connected with her body. “You always think I look beautiful,” she told him in a teasing voice.
“That’s because you always do,” he answered immediately, his hands moving down to caress her ass through the silky fabric of the blue cocktail dress.
Mara sighed as he moved closer, getting drunk off his scent and the deep timbre of his voice. Jared invariably affected her that way. Just that quickly, he could set her body on fire with a desire so strong that it was unstoppable.
“I love you,” she told him softly, looking into his adoring eyes.
“I love you, too, sweetheart,” he rasped, lowering his mouth to hers as he threaded his hands through her hair, undoing her hard work in trying to tame it into an upswept, more sophisticated style.
Any regret she had about her spoiled hair dissolved as she melted into Jared’s embrace.
They were going to be late for the ball, but even that thought was erased from her mind.
A few seconds later, all she could think about was Jared.
CHAPTER 17
I can never fall in love with a man like him.
Evan could still picture those words from Randi, written in her email, over and over again. Of course, she hadn’t been talking about some unknown male. If so, Evan would have been pretty damn happy knowing she was blowing off another guy. However, knowing it had been him she was referring to made him almost certifiable.
Evan rarely got angry, and he still couldn’t figure out why he was so pissed off. After all, did he really think a woman like Randi was going to fall in love with a defective man like him? He was an unromantic, anal type of fucked-up man, focused more on business than anything else in his life.
I’m still trying to prove myself worthy of her friendship, much less her love.
Hell, it didn’t matter, and it didn’t relieve the burning pain in his chest when he thought about the fact that she had written that she could never love a man like him.
I’ll make her love me. She will love me.
Evan wondered if that was even possible, but he didn’t accept defeat well at all. Maybe this wasn’t about business, but it had become just as damned important to him.
It’s more important.
Even as the thought slipped into his mind unconsciously, he admitted it was true. For the first time in his life, someone other than his family took precedence over his portfolio.
“What’s your driver’s name?”