“What makes sense?” he asked.
She settled her eyes on him . . . daring him to call her on what she was about to say.
“Your numbers don’t mesh, Hunter. I know it, you know it.”
His hand stopped playing in the sand. His eyes didn’t leave hers. “My accounts are legit.”
Gabi pointed to her chest. “We all have one thing we’re good at, Hunter. Numbers are my thing. Yours aren’t right. Yeah, you’re worth more than most people can count. But there are discrepancies.” Discrepancies that would feed villages.
“My company has many legs. I wouldn’t doubt there are a few thousand—”
She laughed. Couldn’t help the burst of noise from her throat. “Don’t insult me.”
His relaxed pose on the beach shifted to a sitting position, arms resting on his knees. “How are numbers your thing?”
The question struck her as odd.
“They just are.” That and languages. Well, not many languages, but she was working on expanding her foreign tongue.
“How is it I don’t know this about you?”
“There are many things you don’t know about me,” she told him.
His eyes moved down her body, making her realize she wore next to nothing. He derailed her thoughts with only a look.
Gabi closed her eyes and tried to keep her hands at her sides and not cover her bare midsection.
“My numbers don’t balance and this is why Alliance rejected me?”
“Alliance has many levels one must pass. Everyone has financial secrets. That isn’t a complete deterrent.”
“It’s one. You believe my financial balance isn’t zero.”
“It’s way far from zero. But again. Whose isn’t?”
Hunter glared now. “What else?”
“There are foreign meetings . . . men from questionable backgrounds.”
He nodded, as if her words meant nothing.
“And then there is the jerk factor.”
A lift to his lip was slow in coming. “The jerk factor?”
“Arrogant. Egotistical. Jerk . . . I think Meg would classify you as an asshole.”
“Meg?”
“She may not live in California, but she still works with and for Alliance.”
Hunter grinned as if she’d just complimented him. “I’m an arrogant asshole whose billion-dollar company has divisions where the numbers don’t balance.”
When he said it like that, it sounded trite. “You blackmailed me,” she reminded him.
He glanced around the empty beach. He lowered his voice. “I suppose there are things we both regret from our past.”
She wasn’t sure what to make of that.
“Yet here we are. Married, both of us uneasy about the other.”
“I don’t believe you’ll kill me in my sleep,” he told her.
She grinned.
“You don’t wear orange . . . remember?” he asked, a smirk playing on his lips.
“Orange is the new black.”
Gabi and Meg sat with their heads together, their ears tuned into the noise drifting from the kitchen.
“That’s not right. Do it again.”
“I’m not a cook, Mrs. Masini,” Hunter said for the umpteenth time in the last half an hour.
When Gabi had peeked into her mother’s space, flour covered the entire counter and half the floor. A telltale sign that pasta was in progress. Or at least a mix of flour and eggs. There was no guarantee anyone would be eating anything at this rate.
“Crack the egg gently.”
When Gabi’s mom groaned, Meg started to giggle. “I wish I had a camera set up in there.” Meg stretched her neck in an attempt to see inside the mess.
“Do it again.”
Meg nudged Gabi’s arm. “How long are you going to let that continue?”
Gabi sat back, crossed her legs. “I have nowhere I need to be.”
“No, no, no.” Simona lowered her tone. “Pretend the egg is a fragile woman, not a twist top on a beer.”
Gabi and Meg held their breath and waited . . .
“Better. Now, three more eggs.”
Silence.
Sigh.
Silence.
“Damn it!” Hunter’s patience had to be at an end.
Gabi pushed off the couch. “Distract my mother.”
“You’re going to rescue him?” Meg asked.
“I did throw him in the dark waters of my mother’s kitchen. I think he’s learned his lesson.”
The two of them entered the kitchen at the same time. Meg instantly started to laugh.
Hunter stood over the sink, his hands dripping with raw eggs and flour.
Gabi’s mother was scooping a mound of flour off the counter.
Hunter snapped his eyes to Gabi, causing her to step back. “Maybe I should—”