He shrugs easily. “This isn’t a date.”
Now he’s got my curiosity working double time. It’s the only reason I follow him over to the table, allow him to hold my chair for me. Or at least that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. “What is it, then?”
“Let’s call it a meeting of like-minded individuals.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “I’m not so sure we’re actually like-minded.”
“You might be surprised.” He reaches over and pulls the lid off my dinner plate and it’s all I can do not to show my surprise. Instead of the fancy steak or fish I was expecting, he’s ordered pizza for me. And not just any pizza but the pizza with pineapple and fresh mozzarella that I absolutely adore.
“How did you know?” I demand.
He shrugs, then lifts the cover off his own meal to reveal a pizza loaded with everything but the kitchen sink. “Just lucky, I guess.”
Yeah, right, lucky.
My stomach growls again and he nods to my plate. “Eat.”
The clock is ticking down, my favorite pizza is in front of me and it’s becoming increasingly more obvious that Sebastian isn’t going to let me wiggle my way out of this. Knowing that, I might as well enjoy it. After all, one pizza does not a date make.
He carries the conversation for a while as I stuff my face. But after the second piece, I’m finally nourished enough to say what’s been on my mind ever since he rescued me from the lascivious clutches of Mr. Sheenan.
“You know you can’t keep doing that, right?”
“Doing what?” he asks, taking a long sip of his drink
“Getting in customers’ faces like that because you’re concerned about the state of my ass.”
Instantly, his eyes darken from the color of lush summer grass to a darker, deeper forest green. “I’m concerned about the state of my casino. I’m not sure what the hell kind of policies my father has in place, but I’m not okay with my employees being sexually harassed on the job. Any of my employees,” he stresses. “Not just you. I’ve already had a meeting with senior staff about it.”
The outrage in his voice relaxes me like nothing else could have. Oh, I’m not naïve enough to think that he’s treating all of his employees to pizza dinners in his office—I know I’m getting special treatment because he wants to fuck me—but at the same time, I like that this isn’t just about me. That he’s got a sense of fair play that goes beyond what his dick wants.
Still, I feel obliged to warn him. “You’re going to lose customers that way.”
“Those aren’t the kind of customers I want.”
“That’s not actually a decision you get to make.”
His eyes narrow at that and for the first time since I met him, Sebastian looks arrogant. And not just a little arrogant. No, this is all rich man, power broker, bend people to my will arrogance. It should turn me off—God knows it does with anyone else. Instead it turns me on, curls my toes. Which is a problem. A really serious problem.
“Who does get to make that decision, if not me?” he demands. “This is my place.”
I refrain from saying what we both already know. That the Atlantis is his father’s place and while he might be the prodigal son at the moment, this will always be the hotel that Richard Caine built.
“I’m not saying you can’t run the place by whatever rules you want. I mean, they’re good rules. But men with money are notorious assholes. It comes with the job description.”
He cocks a brow at me. “Oh, really?”
“Yes, really. Present company perhaps excluded.”
“Only perhaps?”
“I’m reserving judgment until I have a few more factors.”
He nods like I’m making perfect sense when really, I’m not even sure what it is I’m saying. I’m trying to be tough here, trying to stay in control. After all, falling for a rich guy—a casino owner, for God’s sake—is so outside the boundaries of my ten year plan that I can barely begin to fathom that I’m here, in his office, eating pizza and verbally sparring with him when I should be grabbing a bag of chips in the employee break room.
“All I’m saying is you can set the boundaries for what kind of behavior you expect. You can even enforce it. But if they don’t like the rules, they’ll find another casino to drop their twenty million dollars at and you’ll lose your whales—and a big fat portion of your bottom line.”
“I appreciate your concern,” he tells me. ??I do. But I’ve got a pretty good handle on the Atlantis’s bottom line. And if it needs to take a hit for a while in order to protect my employees, then I’m perfectly okay with that.”