He laughed. “Not happening.”
“Then neither is dinner.” No matter how much he cajoled she needed distance and a chance to really think before she just jumped back into something foolish with him.
“We have to work together, so I don’t think us spending time together outside the office would be wise,” she said at last. She used to be more impulsive, but wasn’t anymore. Her one-night stand with this man had reminded her there were consequences for acting without thinking.
“The Cari I know doesn’t make decisions with only her head.”
“I’ve changed,” she said bluntly. Maybe if she hadn’t fallen for his smooth-talking ways and blunt sexuality… What?
“I like it,” he said slickly.
Cari knew she had to face facts that the man she’d had a one-night stand with was back in town. And it was becoming abundantly clear that a corporate takeover was the least of her problems. She was going to have to tell him about her son…his son.
Their son.
And she had no idea how to do that.
* * *
Cari had changed. That was easy to see even for a guy who’d spent only one night in her company. Dec knew things between them had always seemed complicated. Never more so than now. Their families were hated enemies of each other and his cousin, Keller Montrose, the CEO of Playtone Games, wasn’t going to be happy unless Infinity was completely broken apart so that nothing of Gregory Chandler’s legacy remained.
And this pretty blonde woman standing before him was going to be nothing more than collateral damage.
Dec had never been able to see her as his hated enemy. From the first moment he’d laid eyes on her he’d wanted to know more about her—and not so he could figure out how to use that information to take over her company.
Being adopted, Dec never truly felt like a real Montrose and was always striving to prove he was as loyal as both Kell and their other cousin, Allan McKinney.
Being back in California, conveniently with Cari, seemed his chance to do his job and continue to prove his worth to the Montrose family, as well as hopefully reconnect with the woman he hadn’t been able to forget. With her thick blond hair that fell in smooth waves past her shoulders and her pretty cornflower-blue eyes, she’d haunted him. He couldn’t forget the way she’d looked up at him as he’d held her in his arms.
Now that he had the chance to get a proper look at her, he could see the year and a half they’d been apart had added a quiet confidence to her. He started at her tiny feet in those pretty brown two-inch heels and moved upward. Her ankles were still trim, but her calves seemed more muscular. The hem of her skirt kept him from seeing any more of her legs but her hips seemed fuller…more pronounced. Her waist was still impossibly small, he noted, as the button on her jacket flaunted. Her breasts—whoa, they were a lot larger. She’d been slim and small but she was much—
“Eyes up here, buddy,” she said, pointing to her baby blues.
He shrugged and then smiled at her. “I can see that you have changed a lot in the past year. Your figure is much fuller than before, but I like that.”
He walked toward her with a long, languid stride and she backed up until there was nowhere for her to go. She put her hand up to stop him, keeping him an arm’s length away. He stood there, staring down into her eyes, and had to admit there was something different about her. It was in her eyes. She watched him more closely than she had before.
She looked tired and he thought, well, duh, Playtone had finally gotten the upper hand on Infinity Games and she was more than likely worried about her job.
He backed away from her. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to come on too strong. I’m sure losing your company to us was a shock.”
“That’s a bit of an understatement.”
He smiled at the way she said it. “I’m a little jet-lagged still.”
“Jet-lagged? I wasn’t aware that there was a time zone between the Infinity Games campus and the Playtone offices,” she said.
She gave up nothing. And he wondered how he could have missed this side to Cari eighteen months ago. But then he’d been in full-on lust and it was safe to say his brain hadn’t been controlling him.
“I’ve been in Australia for a little over a year managing our takeover of Kanga Games.”
“You let them keep their corporate identity,” she said.
“They didn’t screw our grandfather over.”
“My sisters and I didn’t either. We’ve always dealt with you and your cousins fairly.”
“I’m afraid that doesn’t matter when it comes to revenge,” he said.
“Surely profit matters.”