Scandalizing the CEO

That’s right, he reminded himself. He was a loner. He didn’t have room in his life for a woman with soft violet eyes and compassionate hugs.

The only thing he needed a woman for was sex. He and Ainsley were white-hot in bed, but that didn’t mean he wanted to open his veins and bleed for her in private. The article was his public face and no one saw the private man—not even Ainsley.

“You haven’t said anything in almost thirty minutes,” she said.

“You haven’t, either,” he said. They were eating lunch on the patio at his house. He’d shown her his estate and the quiet day he’d envisioned for them hadn’t turned out as he’d planned. They were both tiptoeing around each other and he knew it was past time to get back to the city and back to work.

“I was afraid of saying the wrong thing again.”

“You won’t,” he said. Because he’d buttoned up his emotions and tucked them away. He wouldn’t react as he had earlier. He just hadn’t expected her to ask him questions outside of the article. If you asked most people about seeing their father, it wouldn’t be a big deal. But he was a Devonshire bastard and even if Ainsley wanted to put a better spin on it, the world knew that Malcolm wasn’t much of a father to the boys he’d sired.

But he’d spent his life knowing that his father hadn’t wanted to have anything to do with him. That was why he’d been so reluctant to go to that meeting at the Everest Group and, conversely, why he was so determined to win the contest Malcolm had set in motion. He wanted to show the old man that he—Steven—was better at the business Malcolm had dedicated his life to.

He checked his e-mail on his iPhone and saw that Dinah was back from the States. She’d sent a long file of recommendations and that was just what he needed—to bury himself in work at the office. He felt a twinge of regret that he wasn’t going to follow through on his plan to ask her to live with him, but their awkward conversation today had reminded him what living with someone would entail.

When you were dating you didn’t have to share every detail of your life, but once you moved in…Then came resentment and anger and he didn’t need that. Steven Devonshire was a rock—an island—and he needed nothing.

“I have to get back to the office. A bit of an emergency has come up.”

She nodded. “Let me get my bag and I’ll be ready to go.”

She went back into his house and he watched her go. Knew she’d never be here again. A part of him was really going to miss her. He liked Ainsley more than anyone he’d slept with in a long time. Hell, forever. He’d never met a woman who got to him the way she did.

And she would never know. Could never know, because if she did then she’d want things from him that he’d never be able to give her.

She came back down with her bag and he went to get the car, realizing that he’d simply been sitting there waiting for her the entire time. She did that to him—made him forget the parts of himself that he’d always taken for granted and now he wanted to be that man again. He was a man who didn’t care and was always looking ahead. He would get back to being that way again, he vowed.

He pulled the car up to the front of the house and went in to get her. She was standing in the foyer, thanking his housekeeper for the breakfast she had made.

“Thank you for bringing me here,” she said to him.

“No problem. Sorry we can’t stay longer,” he said.

“No, you aren’t. You’ve been trying to get me out of here ever since I asked about Malcolm.”

He shouldn’t have been surprised that she saw right through him, but he was taken aback that she’d said anything. She had let him take the lead, let him be the one to make the bold moves, and now suddenly she was taking charge.

“I have been. I realized that I’d let a journalist into my house—into my sanctuary. I know I suggested the articles, but I invited you here for personal reasons.”

“I wasn’t in here snooping around and trying to find out your secrets. You and I are lovers, and I asked you for a favor. If I’d realized what your relationship with Malcolm was, I never would have asked,” she said.

“What is my relationship with him?”

“Nonexistent. Right?”

“Very true,” he said, opening the car door for her. “Get in.”

“I’m not done talking yet,” she said.

“I am.”

He held the door a minute longer and she just stood there with a sullen look on her face. A part of him knew he was being unfair to her, but she was asking questions and pointing out things that he never wanted to talk about.