He’d tried to block out the intense need that had been rioting through him from the moment he’d gotten out of bed last night and left her there alone when he’d wanted nothing more than to take her again. And again. And again.

Dante wanted even more to try and eradicate the pain in his chest that seemed to hit him so hard and strong whenever he looked at Paige holding Ana. A mother and her child. The love that passed between them. The truest love he’d known. The love he had lost.

He wanted to crush those feelings. Bury them beneath something stronger. Lust. Sex. Desire.

“Don’t ignore me, Paige,” he said. He swept her hair to the side and bent, pressing a kiss to the side of her neck. “Ever.”

She shivered beneath his touch. “I wasn’t.”

“You were trying to ignore this.” He traced the line of her neck with the tip of his tongue. “And you know we can’t.”

About the Author

MAISEY YATES was an avid Mills & Boon® Modern™ Romance reader before she began to write them. She still can’t quite believe she’s lucky enough to get to create her very own sexy alpha heroes and feisty heroines. Seeing her name on one of those lovely covers is a dream come true.

Maisey lives with her handsome, wonderful, diaper-changing husband and three small children across the street from her extremely supportive parents and the home she grew up in, in the wilds of Southern Oregon, USA. She enjoys the contrast of living in a place where you might wake up to find a bear on your back porch and then heading into the home office to write stories that take place in exotic urban locales.

Recent titles by the same author:

AT HIS MAJESTY’S COMMAND*

A GAME OF VOWS

A ROYAL WORLD APART*

ONE NIGHT IN PARADISE (One Night In …)

*linked duet

Did you know these are also available as eBooks? Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk

Her Little
White Lie
Maisey Yates

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my grandma,

who passed on her love of books and romance to me.

CHAPTER ONE

“EXPLAIN this, or pack up your things and get out.”

Paige Harper looked up from her seated position and into her boss’s dark, angry eyes. Having him here, in her office, was enough to leave her speechless. Breathless. He was handsome from far away and, up close, even enraged, he was arresting. It was hard to look away from him, but she managed. Then she looked down at the newspaper he’d thrown onto the surface of her desk and her heart sank into her stomach.

“Oh …” She picked up the paper. “Oh …”

“Speechless?”

“Oh …”

“I said explain, Ms. Harper. ‘Oh’ is not an explanation in any language that I am aware of.” He crossed his arms over his broad chest and Paige suddenly felt two inches tall.

“I …” She looked back down at the paper, open to the lifestyle section, the main headline reading Dante Romani to Tie the Knot with Employee. Underneath the headline were two pictures. One of Dante, looking forbidding and perfectly pressed in a custom-made suit. And one of her, on a ladder, in a window at Colson’s, hanging strips of tinsel from the ceiling in preparation for the holiday season.

“I …” She tried again as she scanned the article.

Dante Romani, notorious bad boy of the Colson Department Store empire, who just last week made headlines for the callous axing of a top exec, and for replacing the family man in favor of a younger, less-attached man, is now engaged to one of his employees. We can’t help but wonder if playing games with his staff is a favored pastime of the much-maligned businessman. Either firing them or marrying them at will.

Her stomach tightened with horror. She couldn’t fathom how this had ended up in the paper. She’d done a fair amount of panicking over how she was going to fix the lie she’d told the social worker, but she’d thought she would have some time. She hadn’t expected this, not even in her wildest dreams.

But there it was, the lie of the century, shouting at her in black and white.

“That’s hardly more eloquent, or more informative.”

“I told a lie,” she said.

He looked around her office, and her eyes followed his, over the stacks of fabric samples, boxes with beads hanging out of them, aerosol cans of flocking and paint sitting in the corner and Christmas knickknacks spread over every surface.

He looked back at her, his lip curled upward. “On second thought, why don’t you skip packing and just walk out. I can have your things express delivered to you.”

“Wait … no …” Losing her job was unthinkable, as was getting caught in her lie. She needed her job. And she really didn’t need child services to find out she’d lied during her adoption interview. Well, what she really needed was a time machine so that she could go back and opt not to lie to Rebecca Addler, but that was probably a bit too complicated as solutions went.

She looked back down at the article.

It’s hard to imagine that a man who so recently fired someone for being, reportedly more devoted to his family than to the almighty dollar, could settle down and become a family man himself. The question is: Can this thoroughly average woman reform the soulless CEO? Or will she become another in the long line of professional and personal casualties Dante Romani leaves in his wake?

Average woman. Yeah, that sounded like her life. Even in her lie, where she was engaged to the hottest billionaire in town, she came out of it as the average woman.

She swallowed and looked back up at her boss’s blazing expression. “This is horrible journalism. Sensationalist nonsense, really. All but an opinion piece, one might say. Fluff, even.”

Dante cut her off, his black eyes hard, flat. “What did you hope to accomplish with this? Was it fun gossip you didn’t think would spread around to this degree? Or was it something you wanted?”

She stood, her knees shaking. “No, I just …”

“You might not be newsworthy, Ms. Harper, but I am.”

“Hey!” The assessment burned, especially on the heels of the descriptor of her as “average.” Of course, she had to admit, looking at their pictures side by side, that average was a pretty kind descriptor.

“Did I offend you?”

“A little.”

“I guarantee it is not half so offensive as coming into work to discover you’re engaged to someone you have barely had four conversations with.”

“Actually, I’m sort of in the same boat you are. I didn’t expect for this to be in the paper. I didn’t … I didn’t expect for anyone to ever find out.”

“Be that as it may, they have. And now I have. It would be best if you were to see yourself out. I do not wish to call security.” He turned and started to walk out of the room and she felt her heart slide the rest of the way down.

“Mr. Romani,” she said, “please, hear me out.” She was nearly pleading. No, who was she kidding? She was pleading. And she wasn’t ashamed. She would get down on her knees and beg if she had to, but she wasn’t going to let him ruin this.

“I tried. You had nothing of interest to say.”

“Because I don’t know where to start.”

“The beginning works for me.”

She took a deep breath. “Rebecca Addler frowns on single mothers. Not every social worker does, but this one … this one doesn’t like them. I mean, not that she doesn’t like them personally, but in general. And she asked me why Ana would be better off with me as opposed to a real, traditional family with a mother and a father and I just sort of told her that there would be a father because I was getting married and then your name slipped out because … well, because I work for you, so I see it a lot and it was the first name I thought of.”

He blinked twice, then shifted, his head tilted to the side. “That was not the beginning.”

Paige took another deep breath, trying to slow down her brain and find a better starting point. “I’m trying to adopt.”

He frowned. “I didn’t know.”

“Well, I have my daughter in the day care here.”

“I don’t go to the day care,” he said, his tone flat.

“Ana’s just a baby. She’s been with me almost from the moment she was born. I …” Thinking of Shyla still made her throat tighten, made her ache everywhere. Her beautiful, vivacious best friend. The only person who’d really enjoyed her eccentricity rather than simply bearing it. “Her mother is gone. And I’m taking care of her. Nothing was made official before Shyla … anyway she’s a ward now.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning the state has the final say over her placement. It’s been fine for me to foster her, I’m approved for that. But … but not necessarily for adopting. I’ve been trying and I had a meeting with the worker handling the case two days ago. It was looking like they weren’t going to approve the adoption. And yes, I lied. About us. And about … the engagement, but please believe it had nothing to do with you.”

A slight lie. It had a lot to do with the fact that he was much better looking than any man had a right to be. And she had to go in to work in the same building as he did, and chance walking by him in the halls. Being exposed to all that male beauty was a hazard.

So, yes, there were times she thought of him away from work. In fairness, he was the best-looking man she’d ever encountered in her entire life, and she was in a dating dry spell of epic proportions, which meant, pleasant time with images of Dante was about all she had going on in her love life.

And she saw the man all the time, and that made things worse.

As a result of the exposure, when pressed for the name of her fiancé by Rebecca Addler, the only man she’d been able to picture had been Dante. And so his name had sort of spilled out.

Another gaffe in a long line of them for her. When it came to “oops,” she was well above average.

So there, newspaper reporter.

One of his dark eyebrows shot upward. “I’m flattered.”

She put her hand on her forehead. “There is no way for me to win trying to explain this,” she said. “It’s just awkward. But … but … I don’t really know what to do now. It wasn’t supposed to be in the paper, and now it is, and if it turns out we aren’t engaged they’ll know that I lied and then …”

“And then you’ll be a single mother who is also a liar. Two strikes, I would think.” His tone was so disengaged, so unfeeling.

She swallowed. “Well, exactly.”

He was right. Two strikes. If not a plain old strikeout. It wasn’t an acceptable risk. Not where Ana was concerned. Ana, the brightest spot in her life. Her helpless little girl, the baby she loved more than her own life. There was nothing and no one else she would even consider stooping to this level of subterfuge for, nothing else that could possibly compel her to do what she was starting to think she had to do: propose to her boss.

The man who practically stole the air from her lungs when he walked into a room. The man who was so far out of her league, even thinking of a dinner date with him was laughable.

But this was bigger than that. Bigger than a little crush or her insecurity. Her fear of outright rejection.

“I … I think I need your help.”

There was no change in his expression. Dante Romani was impossible to read, but then, that wasn’t really new. He was the dark prince of the Colson empire, the adopted son of Don and Mary Colson. The media speculated that they’d adopted him because he’d shown profound brilliance at an early age. No one imagined it had been his personality that had won over the older couple.

She’d always thought those stories were sad and unfair. Now she wondered. Wondered if he was as heartless as he was portrayed to be. She really hoped he wasn’t, because she was going to need him to care at least a little bit in order to pull this off.

“I’m not in the position to give this kind of help,” he said, his tone dry.

“Why?” she asked, pushing herself into a standing position. “Why not? I … I don’t need you forever, I just need …”

“You need me to marry you. I think that’s a step too far into crazy town, don’t you?”

“For my daughter,” she said, the words raw, loud and echoing in the room. And now that she’d said them, out loud, she didn’t regret them. She would do anything for Ana. Even this. Even if it meant getting thrown out of the office building.

Because for the first time in her memory, something mattered. It mattered more than self-protection or fending off disappointment. It was worth the possibility of adding to her list of failures.

“She’s not your daughter,” he said.

She gritted her teeth, trying to keep a handle on the adrenaline that was pounding through her, making her shake. “Blood isn’t everything. I would think you would understand that.” Probably not the best idea to be taking shots at him, but it was true. He should understand.

He regarded her for a moment, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “I will not fire you. For now. But I will require further explanation. An explanation that makes sense. What do you have on your agenda for the day?”

“I’m working on Christmas,” she said, indicating the array of decorations spread out in the room. “For Colson’s and for Trinka.” She was working on a series of elegant displays for the parent store, and for their offshoot, teen clothing store, something mod and edgy.

“You’ll be in the office?”

She nodded. “Just fiddling today.”

“Good. Don’t leave until we’ve spoken again.” He turned and walked out of her office and she sank to her knees, her hands shaking, her entire body wound so tight she wanted to curl in on herself.

She was so stupid. Nothing new. She’d spoken without thinking. As per usual. Only this time it had landed her in serious trouble, with the man who signed her checks.

Everything was in his hands now. Her future. Her family. Her money.

“Time to learn to think before you talk,” she said into the empty office. Unfortunately, it was too late for that. Way, way too late.

Dante finished with the last item of work on his agenda and turned to his file cabinet, placing the last document on his desk into its appropriate spot. Then he put his elbows on the desk and leaned forward, staring at the newspaper on the shining surface.

He’d studied the news story again when he’d come back into his office. A scathing piece on how the impostor of the Colson family moved people around like pawns on a chessboard. It was stacked with details about the man, Carl Johnson, he’d fired last week for skipping out on an important meeting to go to a child’s sporting event.

The press had covered it a week ago, too, since Carl had gone screaming to the papers over discrimination of some kind. In Dante’s mind, it wasn’t discrimination to expect an employee to attend mandatory meetings, no matter whether it was the last game of a five-year-old’s T-ball season or not.

Still, it had been another of those juicy bits the media had latched on to to further stack the case against him and his possession of human decency. It generally didn’t matter to him.

But one thing in that article stood out to him: Can she reform him?

Could Paige Harper reform him? The idea amused him. He had the bare minimum of contact with her. She did her job, and she did it well, so he never had a reason to involve himself. But he had noticed her. Impossible not to. She was a blur of shimmer when she moved around the office. Boundless energy and a sense of the accidental radiated from her.

He would be lying if he said he wasn’t intrigued by her. She was a window into so many things he would never seek out: chaos, color, motion. So many things he would never be. Combined with the fact that she had a figure most men would be hard-pressed to ignore, and yes, he was intrigued by her.

But no matter how intrigued, she simply wasn’t the sort of woman he would normally approach. Until this.

“Can this thoroughly average woman reform the soulless CEO?”

He had no desire to take part in a reformation, but the idea of an image overhaul in the media? That had possibilities.

He could have demanded a retraction the moment he’d walked in that morning. Or he could let it run. Let them build off the image they’d created for him when he’d been thrust into the spotlight. A fourteen-year-old boy, adopted, finally, and suspected of being capable of all manner of violence and sociopathic behaviors.

His story had been written in the public eye before he’d had a chance to live it. And so he had never challenged it. Had never cared.

But suddenly he had been handed a tool that might help change things.

He turned around and faced the windows, looked out at the harbor. He could still see the look on her face. Not just the expression, but the depth of fear and desperation in her eyes. The press had a few things right about him, and one of them was that feelings, emotions, mattered little to him. And still … still he couldn’t forget. And he thought of the baby, too.

He had no use for children. No desire for them. But he could remember being one all too well. Could remember being passed around the foster care system for eight years of his life. Could remember what it was like to be at the mercy of either the State, or, before that, adults who brought harm, not love.

Could he consign Ana to that same fate? Or to a family who might not feel that same desperate longing that Paige seemed to feel for her?

And why should he care at all? That was the million-dollar question. Caring wasn’t counted among his usual afflictions.

The door to his office opened and Paige breezed in. Maybe breezed was the wrong term. A breeze denoted something gentle, soothing even. Paige was more a gale-force wind.

She had a big, gold bag hanging off her shoulder, one that matched her glittering, golden pumps that likely added four inches to her height. She also had a bolt of fabric held tightly beneath the other arm, and a large sketchbook beneath that. She looked like she might drop all of it at any moment.

She plunked her things down in the chair in front of his desk, bending at the waist, her skirt tightening over the curve of her butt, and pushed her hand back through her dark brown hair, revealing a streak of bright pink nearly hidden beneath the top layers.

She was a very bright woman in general, one of the things that made her impossible to ignore. Bright makeup, lime-green on her lids, magenta on her lips, and matching fingernails. She made for an enticing picture, one he found himself struggling to look away from.

“You said to come in and see you before I left?”

“Yes,” he said, breaking his focus from her for the first time since she’d come in, looking at the items she’d chucked haphazardly into the chair. He had a very strong urge to straighten them. Hang them on a hook. Anything but simply let them lie there.

“Are you going to fire me?”

“I don’t think so,” he said, tightening his jaw. “Tell me more about your situation.”

A little wrinkle appeared between her brows, her full lips turning down. “In a nutshell, Shyla was my best friend. We moved here together. She got a boyfriend, got pregnant. He left. And everything was fine for a while, because we were working it out together. But she got really sick after giving birth to Ana. She lost a lot of blood during delivery and she had a hard time recovering. She ended up … there was a clot and it traveled to her lungs.” She paused and took a breath, her petite shoulders rising and falling with the motion. “She died and that left … Ana and I.”

He pushed aside the strange surge of emotion that hit him in the chest. The thought of a motherless child. A mother the child had lost to death. He tightened his jaw. “Your friend’s parents?”

“Shyla’s mother has never been around. Her father is still alive as far as I know, but he wouldn’t be able to care for a child. He wouldn’t want to, either.”

“And you can’t adopt unless you’re married.”

She let out a long breath and started pacing. “It’s not that simple. I mean, she didn’t say that absolutely. There’s no … law, or anything. I mean, obviously. But from the moment Rebecca Addler, the caseworker, came to my apartment it was clear that she wasn’t thrilled with it.”

“What’s wrong with your apartment?”

“It’s small. I mean, it’s nice—it’s in a good area, but it’s small.”

“Housing is expensive in San Diego.”

“Yes. Exactly. Expensive. So I have a small apartment, and right now Ana shares a room with me. And I admit that a fifth-floor apartment isn’t ideal for raising a child, but plenty of people do it.”

“Then why can’t you do it?” he asked, frustration starting to grow in his chest, making it feel tight. Making him feel short-tempered.

“I don’t know why. But it was really obvious by the way she said … by how she was saying that Ana would be better off with a mother and a father, and didn’t I want her to have that? Well, that made it pretty obvious that she really doesn’t want me to get custody. And … I panicked.”

“And somehow my name came into this? And into the paper?”

Her cheeks turned a deep shade of pink. “I don’t know how that happened. The paper. I can’t imagine Rebecca … If you could have met her, you would know she didn’t do it. Maybe whoever handled the paperwork because I know she made a note.”

“A note?”

Paige winced. “Yeah. A note.”

“Saying?”

“Your name. That we’d just gotten engaged. She said it was possible it would make a difference.”

“You don’t think it has more to do with the fact that I’m a billionaire than it has to do with the fact that you’re getting married.”

He was under no illusion about his charm, or lack of it. And neither was the world in general. The thing that attracted women to him was money. The thing that made him acceptable in the eyes of the social worker would be the same thing. Monetarily, he would be able to provide for a child. Several children, and that did matter. A sorry way to decide parentage in his opinion.

But that was the way the world worked. Coming from having none, to having more than he could ever spend, had taught him that in a very effective way.

“Possibly,” she said, sucking her bright pink bottom lip into her mouth and worrying it with her teeth.

His phone rang and he punched the speaker button. “Dante Romani.”

His assistant’s nervous voice filled the room. “Mr. Romani,” he said, “the press have been calling all afternoon looking for a statement … about your engagement.”

Dante shot Paige his deadliest glare. She didn’t shrink. She hardly seemed to notice. She was looking past him, out the window, at the harbor, twirling a lock of hair around her finger, her knees shaking back and forth. She was the most … haphazard creature he’d ever seen.

“What about it?” Dante asked, still unsure how he was going to play it.

As far as the press was concerned, he was marrying Paige and he was adopting a child with her. To go back on that a day later would kill the last vestiges of speculation that he might possess honor or human decency. That wasn’t exactly a goal of his. Yes, by the standards of some, he lacked charm. Really, he just wasn’t inclined to kiss ass, and he never had been. But it didn’t mean he was angling for a complete character assassination by the media, either.

If things got too bad, and they were headed that way, it might affect business. And that was completely unacceptable to him. Don and Mary Colson had adopted an heir to their fortune, to their department store empire, for a reason. It was not so he could let it fail.

And then there was Ana. Dante didn’t like children. Didn’t want them. But the memories from his own childhood, memories of foster care, of going from home to home, sometimes good, sometimes not, were strong.

Perhaps Ana would be adopted right away. But would they care for her? Would they love her? Paige did; that much even he could recognize.

This concern, for another human being, was unusual for him. It was foreign. But he couldn’t deny that it was there. Very real, very strong. The need to spare an innocent child from some of the potential horrors of life. Horrors he knew far too well.

“They want details,” Trevor said.

Dante’s eyes locked with Paige’s. “Of course they do.” So do I. “But they’ll have to wait. I have no statement at this time.” He punched the off button on the phone’s intercom. “But I will need one,” he said to Paige. A plan was forming in his mind, a way to take this potential PR disaster and turn it into something that would benefit him. But first, he wanted to hear an explanation. “What do you propose we do?”

Paige stopped jiggling her leg. “Get married?” Her expression was so hopeless, so utterly lost looking. “Or … at least let the engagement go on for a while?” The desperation, coming from her in waves, was palpable.

No one had ever cared for him with so much passion, not in the years since he’d lost his birth mother. He didn’t regret it. It was far too late in life for that.

But it isn’t too late for Ana.

He looked back down at the newspaper. It wouldn’t only be for Ana anyway. It was a strange thought … the idea of being able to manipulate the image he’d always had in the press.

He’d grown from sullen teenage boy to feared man all in the eye of the public. For years he’d been painted as an unloving, ungrateful adopted child who had no place in the Colson family. As he’d grown up, his image had changed to that of a hard boss, a heartless lover who drew women in with sexual promises, sensual corruption and money before discarding them. It colored the way people saw him. The way they talked to him. The way they did business with him.

What would it be like to have it change? It wouldn’t last, of course. He wouldn’t stay with her. Wouldn’t pursue anything remotely resembling a real marriage. An engagement though, at least for a while, had interesting possibilities.

But to be seen as the angel rather than the devil … it was an interesting thought. It might make certain transactions easier. Smoother.

Dante was past the point where negative character assessments bothered him. Unless they affected a business. And in the past, he knew people had shied away from dealings with him thanks to his reputation.

A womanizer. Heartless. Cutthroat. Dangerous. It had all been said and then some, most of it spun from speculation and created stories. Would it change things if he were considered settled? A family man? Even if it wasn’t permanent, it could quite possibly shift how people saw him.

An interesting thought indeed.

Can she reform him? The real question was, could he use her to reform his image?

For a moment, a brief moment, he allowed himself to think of the many ways he could use her. Fantasies that had been on the edge of his consciousness every time she breezed through the office. Fantasies he had not allowed.

He gave them a moment’s time, and then shut the door on them. It was not her body he needed.

“All right, Ms. Harper, for the purposes of keeping the facade, I accept your proposal.”

Her blue eyes widened. “You … what?”

“I have decided that I will marry you.”

CHAPTER TWO

PAIGE was pretty sure the floor shook underneath her feet. But Dante didn’t look at all perturbed, and everything appeared to be stable, so maybe the shaking was all internal.

“You … what?”

“I accept. At least on a surface level. At least until the furor in the media dies down.”

“I … Okay,” she said, watching her boss as he stood from his position behind his desk. His movements were methodical, planned and purposeful.

He was always like that. Smooth and unruffled. She had wondered, more than once, what it took to get him to loosen up. What it took to shake that perfect, well-ordered control.

She’d wondered, only a couple of times, if a lover ever managed to do it for him. Loosen his tie, run her fingers through his hair.

Now she knew she had the power to do it. Not in the way a lover would, but by inadvertently leaking a fake engagement to the press.

“Excellent,” he said, his tone clipped. Decisive. “I see no reason why this can’t work.”

“I … Why?”

“Is this not what you want? What you need?”

Her head was spinning. This morning everything in her world had been on the verge of collapse, and now—now it seemed like she might actually be able to keep it all standing. “Well … yes. But let’s be honest. You aren’t exactly known for your accommodating and helpful nature, sorry, so it seems … out of character.”

He bent and picked up the paper from his desk, his dark eyes skimming it. “Can you imagine what the media would say if I backed out? They’re already salivating for the chance to rip me to pieces if I would just give it to them. This article is practically a setup for the following piece where they will gleefully report that I have dropped my subordinate fiancée, who I was likely playing power games with, for my own debauched satisfaction, and ruined her chances of adopting her much-loved child. It would have an even darker angle to it, considering I myself am adopted. I can see that headline now.”

“Well, yes, I can see how that would be … not good. But I’m surprised they just … believed that we were engaged anyway.” Average woman. That was what they’d called her in the paper. And Dante Romani would never be linked with a woman who was average.

In so many ways it was like a bad joke. A cruel high school flashback.

“Been reading stories about me?” he asked, his lips curving into a half smile.

“Well, I mean, I see them,” she said, stuttering. He didn’t need to know that sometimes she looked at pictures of him for a little longer than necessary. It wasn’t like anyone could blame her. She was a woman; he was a stunningly attractive man. But she knew she had no shot with him, ever. And no desire to take one. “But also, we haven’t really been seen together in public, so it seems odd that they would just assume, based on a random tip, that we’re engaged.”

He shrugged. “It sounds like something I would do. Keep a real relationship under wraps. In theory. I haven’t had one, so I wouldn’t know.”

“Right. Yes. I know that.”

“You do read the stories, then.”

Her cheeks heated and she cleared her throat. “That and I have keen powers of observation and … Oh, no!”

“What?”

Paige looked at the clock on Dante’s wall, positioned just above his head. “I have to go pick Ana up. Everyone is probably waiting on me.”

“I’ll come with you,” he said.

“What?” She needed to get away from him for a minute. Or have flustered-angry Dante back. Now that he had a plan he had taken firm control over everything and it was making her feel dazed.

“Well, I am your fiancé now, am I not?”

Paige’s head was swimming, her fingers feeling slightly numb. “I don’t know … are you?”

He nodded once. “Yes. For all intents and purposes.”

“Oookay then.”

“You seem uncertain, Paige,” he said, taking his coat off the peg that was mounted to the wall and opening the door.

Paige scrambled to collect her things from the chair. “I … I’m not, not really. I just don’t know how you went from spitting nails in my office to … agreeing.”

“I’m a man of action. I don’t have time to be indecisive.”

She walked past him and out into the lobby area of his floor. His assistant, Trevor, was positioned behind his desk, his eyes locked on to the both of them.

“Have a nice evening, Mr. Romani,” he said.

“You too, Trevor. You should go home,” Dante said.

“In a bit. So …”

“Oh, yeah,” Paige said. “We’re engaged.”

“You are?” he asked, his expression skeptical.

Paige nodded and looked at Dante who looked … uncharacteristically amused. “Yes,” she said.

He nodded. “Yes.”

“I … didn’t know,” Trevor said.

“I’m a private man,” Dante said. “When it suits me.”

“Apparently,” Trevor said, looking back at his computer screen.

“See you tomorrow,” Dante said. Trevor made a vague nod in acknowledgment.

Paige followed Dante to the elevator and stepped inside when the doors opened. “So … Trevor doesn’t seem thrilled,” she said. Really, she was surprised at the dynamic between Dante and his assistant. Dante was something of a fearsome figure in her mind, and the fact that Trevor hadn’t been fired on the spot for his obvious annoyance with the situation wasn’t exactly what she’d expected.

“Trevor is mad because he didn’t know,” Dante said. “Because he likes to know everything, and make sure it’s jotted down in my schedule at least six months in advance.”

“And you don’t mind that he was … upset?”

Dante frowned. “Why? Did you expect me to throw him from the thirtieth-floor window?”

“It was a possibility I hadn’t ruled out.”

“I’m not a tyrant.”

“No?” He gave her a hard stare. “Well, you fired Carl Johnson. For the baseball game,” she said.

“And it makes me a tyrant because I expect my employees to show up during work hours and earn the generous salaries I pay them?” he asked.

“Well … it was for his child’s T-ball game …”

“That meant nothing to anyone else in the meeting. It might have personally meant something to Carl, but not to anyone else. And if everyone was allowed to miss work anytime something seemed like it might take precedence for them personally, we would not be able to get anything done.”

“Well, what about when you have something in your personal life that requires attention.”

“I have neatly handled what might have been a dilemma by having no personal life,” he said, his tone hard.

“Oh. Well …”

“You expect me to be unreasonable because of what is written about me,” he said, “in spite of what you see in the office on a daily basis. Which only serves to prove the power of the media. And the fact that it’s time I manipulated it to my advantage.”

Her face burned. “I … suppose.” It was true. Dante was a hard man but, other than this morning, she’d never heard him raise his voice. As bosses went, he’d never been a bad one. But she’d always gotten an illicit thrill when he was around. A sense of something dark. And it was very likely the media was to blame.

“And you do read the stories they write about me,” he said, as if he was able to read her mind.

She pursed her lips. “Fine. I’ve read some of what’s been written about you.”

“Being a tyrant implies a lack of control, in my opinion, Paige. And it shows an attempt to claim it in a very base way. I have control over this company, of my business, in all situations, and I don’t have to raise my voice to get it.”

She cleared her throat and stared straight ahead at the closed elevator door. At their warped reflections in the gleaming metal. She came just past his shoulder, and that was in her killer heels. She looked … tiny. A bit awkward. And he looked … well, like Dante always looked. Dark and delicious, supremely masculine, completely not awkward and just a little frightening.

“You raised your voice when you were in my office,” she said, still looking at reflection Dante, and not actual Dante. Actual Dante was almost too handsome to look at directly, especially when standing so close to him.

He laughed, a short, one-note sound. “It was deserved in the situation, don’t you think?”

“Was it?”

“How would you have felt if the situations were reversed?”

“I don’t know. Look, are you serious about this?” she asked, turning to face him just as the doors to their floor slid open.

“I don’t joke very often, if at all,” he said.

“Well, that’s true. But in my experience when men say they want to date me, it can turn out to have been a cruel joke, so I’m thinking my boss agreeing to get engaged to me could be something along those same lines.”

“What is this?”

She shook her head. “Nothing, just … high school. You are planning on following through with this, right? Dante, if I get caught—committing fraud, basically—it might not just be Ana that I lose.”

“As previously stated, Paige, I do not joke. I am not joking now.”

“I just don’t understand why you’re helping me.”

“Because it helps me.”

He said it with such certainty, and no shame.

Paige sputtered. “In what regard?”

“People see me … well, as a tyrant. If not that, a corruptor of innocents, and perhaps, the personification of Charon, ready to lead people down the river Styx and into Hades.”

He said it lightly, with some amusement, though his expression stayed smooth. Paige laughed. “Uh, yes, well, I suppose that’s true.”

“Already there is speculation that you might manage to reform me. The idea of giving that impression … I find it intriguing. An interesting social experiment if nothing else, and one with the potential to improve business for me.”

“Of course you would also actually be helping me and Ana,” she pointed out.

He nodded once. “I don’t find that objectionable.”

She could have laughed. He said it so seriously, as if she might really think he would find helping others something vile. And he said it like that perception didn’t bother him.

“Okay. Good.” She continued on down the hall with him, on the way to the day care center that she’d come to be so grateful for.

She opened the door and sighed heavily when she saw Genevieve, the main caregiver, holding Ana. They were the last two there. “I’m so sorry,” she said, dumping her things on the counter and reaching for Ana.

Genevieve smiled. “No worries. She’s almost asleep again. She did scream a little bit when five rolled around and you weren’t here.”

Paige frowned, a sharp pain hitting her in the chest. Ana was only four months old, but she already knew Paige as her mother. There had been such few moments in Paige’s life when she’d been certain of something, where she hadn’t felt restless and on the verge of failure.

One of those moments was when she’d been hired to design the window displays for Colson’s. The other was when Shyla had placed Ana in Paige’s arms.

Can you take care of her?

She’d only meant for a moment. While she rested and tried to shake some of the chronic fatigue that came with having a newborn. But Shyla had lain down on their sofa for a nap that day and never woken up. And Paige was still taking care of Ana. Because she had to. Because she wanted to. Because she loved Ana more than her own life.

Genevieve transferred Ana and her blanket into Paige’s arms, and Paige pulled her daughter in close, her heart melting, her eyes stinging. She looked back at Dante, and she knew that she’d done the right thing.

Because she would be damned if anyone was taking Ana from her, and she would do whatever she had to do to insure that no one did. Ana was hers forever. And even if marriage to Dante wasn’t strictly necessary, she would take it as insurance every time.

Genevieve bent to retrieve Ana’s diaper bag, then popped back up, her eyes widening when she registered the presence of their boss. “Mr. Romani, what brings you down here?”

Paige thought the girl had a slightly hopeful edge to her voice. As if she was hoping Dante had come to ravish her against the wall. Something Paige could kind of relate to, since Dante had that effect. Even Paige, who knew better than to fantasize about men who were so far out of her league, struggled with the odd Dante-themed fantasy. It was involuntary, really.

“I’m here to collect Ana,” he said.

Genevieve looked confused. “Oh … I …” He reached over the counter and took the diaper bag from the surprised-looking Genevieve.

“With Paige,” he finished. “It was announced in the news today, but in case you haven’t heard, Paige and I are to be married.”

Genevieve’s mouth dropped open. “Oh, I …”

“Let’s go, cara mia,” he said, sweeping Paige’s things from the counter and gathering them into his arms. Her big, broad-chested Italian boss, clutching her sequined purse to his chest, was enough to make her dissolve into hysteric fits of laughter, but there was something else, another feeling, one that made her stomach tight and her chest warm, stopping the giggles.

She wiggled her fingers in Genevieve’s direction and walked through the door, which Dante was currently holding open for her with his shoulder.

Paige continued down the hall, heading toward the parking garage. Dante was behind her, still holding all of her things. She stopped. “Sorry, I can take that.”

“I’ve got it,” he said.

“But you don’t have to … I mean … you don’t have to walk me out to my car.”

“I think I do,” he said.

“No. You really don’t. There’s no reason.”

“We have just announced our engagement. Do you think I would let my fiancée walk out to her car by herself, with a baby, a diaper bag, a purse and … whatever else I’m currently holding?”

“Maybe not,” she said. “But then, you don’t really have a reputation for being chivalrous.”

“Perhaps not,” he said, “but I’m changing it, remember?”

“Why exactly?”

“Walk while you talk,” he said.

Not for the first time, Paige noticed that he didn’t look at Ana. She seemed no more interesting to him than the inanimate objects in his arms. Most people softened when they saw her, reached out and touched her cheek or hair. Not Dante.

“Okay,” she said, turning away from him and continuing on. “So … how are we going to do this?” she asked.

She paused at the door, a strange, new habit she seemed to have developed just since coming down from the top floor with Dante. And he didn’t let her down. He reached past her and opened the door, holding it for her as she walked into the parking garage.

“Where are you parked?” he asked.

“There,” she said, flicking her head to the right. “I get to park close now because of Ana.”

“Nice policy,” he said. “I don’t believe I was responsible for it.”

“I think your father was.”

A strange expression passed over his face. “Interesting. But very like Don. He’s always been very practical. One reason he put in the day care facility early on. Because he knew that employees with children needed to feel like their family concerns were a priority. And better for the company because it ensures that there will be minimal issues with employees missing work because of child care concerns. Of course, missing baseball games cannot be helped sometimes, and I am not putting a field in the parking garage,” he finished dryly.

“I imagine not.” She shifted, not quite sure what to do next. “Well, I’ve never met your father, but judging by some of the policies here, he’s a very good man.”

Dante nodded. “He is.”

Paige turned and headed toward her car. “Oh … purse,” she said, stopping her progress and turning to look at Dante. He started trying to extricate the glittery bag from the pile in his arms. Then she checked the door. “Never mind, I forgot to lock it.”

“You forgot to lock it?”

“It’s secure down here,” she said, pulling the back door open and depositing the sleeping Ana in her seat.

“Locking it would make it doubly secure,” he said, his tone stiff.

She straightened. “How long have you lived in this country?”

He frowned. “Since I was six. Why?”

“You just … you speak very formal English.”

“It’s my second language. And anyway, Don and Mary speak very formal English. They are quite upper-crust, you know.”

“And you call them by their first names?”

“I was fourteen when they adopted me, which I’m sure you know given your proclivity for tabloids.”

“Wow. Exaggerate much? Proclivity …”

“And,” he continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “it would have seemed strange to call them anything other than their first names. I was adopted to be the heir to the Colson empire, more than I was adopted to be a son.”

“Is that what they told you?”

His expression didn’t alter. “It’s the only reason I can think of.”

“Then why aren’t you a Colson?” She’d often wondered that, but she’d never asked, of course. Partly because until today she’d never had more than a moment to speak to him.

“Something Don and I agreed on from the start. I wished to keep my mother’s name.”

“Not your father’s?”

His face hardened, his dark eyes black, blank. “No.”

Paige blinked. “Oh.” She looked back down at Ana, who was sleeping soundly and was buckled tightly into her seat. She closed the door and leaned against the side of the car. “So … I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

“You’ll see me tonight,” he said, turning away from her.

“What?”

“We’re not going into this without a plan. And if I’m going to help you, you will help me. It’s in both of our best interests that it look real, once we take one step into confirming this, there is no going back. You understand?”

She nodded slowly.

“And you need to remember this. It’s essential for you, much more than it is for me. If this blows up it would simply be another bruise on my reputation, and frankly, what’s one more beating in that area? You on the other hand …”

“I could lose everything,” she said, a sharp pang of regret hitting her in the stomach.

“So we’ll make sure we don’t misstep,” he said. “I’ll follow you to your apartment.”

The thought of him, so big and masculine and … orderly, in her tiny, cluttered space, made her feel edgy. Of having a man, any man really, but a man like him specifically, in her space, was so foreign. But really, there was no other option. And she couldn’t act like he made her nervous. He was supposed to be her fiancé.

And people were somehow supposed to believe that he had chosen her.

“I feel dizzy,” she said.

He frowned. “Should I drive?”

She shook her head. “I’ll be fine,” she said, opening the driver’s side door. “I’ll be fine,” she repeated again, for her own benefit more than his.

And she really hoped it was true.

CHAPTER THREE

PAIGE’S house was very like her. Bright, disordered and a bit manic. The living area was packed with things. Canvases, mannequins, bolts of fabric. There was a large bookshelf at the back wall filled with bins. Bins of beads, sequins and other things that sparkled. Her office had simply been the tip of the iceberg.

This was the glittery underbelly.

“Sorry about the mess,” she said. “You can just dump my stuff on the couch.” She set the baby’s car seat gently on the coffee table and bent, unbuckling the little girl from her seat, drawing her to her chest.

He looked away from the scene. Watching her with the baby reminded him of things. He wasn’t even sure what things exactly, because every time a piece of memory tried to push into his mind, he pushed it out.

He focused instead on trying to find a hook of some kind, something to hang her bag on at least.

“Just dump it,” she said, shifting Ana in her arms.

“I don’t … dump things,” he said tightly.

She rolled her eyes. “Then hold Ana while I do it.”

He drew back, discomfort tightening his throat. “I don’t hold babies.”

She rolled her eyes. “Pick one,” she said.

He set her purse on her kitchen counter and then went farther into the living room, depositing her fabric on another pile of fabric, and placing her sketchbook next to a bin that had paints and pencils in it.

That had some reason to it, at least.

She laughed. “You couldn’t do it. You couldn’t just dump it.”

“There’s nothing wrong with caring for what you have.”

“I do care for it.”

“How do you find everything in here?”

She cocked her head to the side and he caught sight of the flash of pink buried in her hair again. “Easily.” She put her hand on Ana’s back and patted her absently, pacing across the living room.

There was no denying that she looked at ease in her surroundings, even if he couldn’t fathom it. He needed order. A space for everything. A clear and obvious space for himself. He prized it, above almost everything else.

He cleared his throat. “What size ring do you wear?”

“Six,” she said, frowning. “Why?”

“You need one.”

“Well, I have rings. I can just wear one of those,” she said, waving her hand in dismissal.

“You do not have the sort of ring I would buy the woman I intended to marry.”

She paused her pacing. “Well, maybe you wouldn’t buy the sort of ring I would want.”

“We’ll come to a compromise, but your engagement ring must be up to my standards.”

She groaned and sank onto the couch, baby Ana still resting against her chest. “This is bizarre.”

“You’re the one who said we were engaged.”

“Yes. I know. And I knew the minute I said it I was in over my head but it just … popped out.”

For some reason, he didn’t doubt her. Probably because he was the least logical option to choose. If she’d been thinking, she would have chosen a different man. One who liked children and puppies and had some semblance of compassion.

He was not that man, and he knew it as well as everyone around him.

“I can’t lose her,” she said, her focus on the baby in her arms. “I can’t let one stupid mistake ruin her life. And mine.”

He looked at Paige, at the baby nestled against her, ignoring the piece of his brain that demanded he look away from the scene of maternal love. Ana took a deep breath, almost a sigh, that lifted her tiny shoulders and shook her whole little frame. She was content, at rest, against the woman she knew as her mother.

Unexpectedly, genuine concern wrenched his gut. It was foreign. Emotion, in general, was foreign to him. But this kind even more so.

“I understand,” he said. And he found that he did. “But that means this can’t just look real, it has to be real.”

It occurred to him, just as he spoke the words. The engagement wouldn’t be enough. It would have to be more. It would have to be marriage.

“You want to keep Ana.”

“More than anything,” she said.

“Then we have to be sure that the adoption is final before we go our separate ways. We need to get married, not just get engaged.”

She blinked twice. “Like … really get married?”

“I think a government office would be especially concerned with the legality of our union so we can’t very well jump over a broom on the beach.”

“But … but a real marriage?”

“Of course.”

Her blue eyes widened. “What do you mean by that?”

He almost laughed at the abject horror evident in her expression. Most women didn’t look horrified if it was implied they might sleep together; on the contrary, he was used to women being eager to accept the invitation or eager to seek him out.

Though he turned his share down. Far too many were out to reform the bad boy. To make the man with the heart of stone care, to reach him, save him, perhaps. Something that simply wasn’t possible.

He wasn’t a sadist and he had no interest in hurting people. He could easily take advantage of wide-eyed innocents with a desire to reform him. But he didn’t. He wouldn’t.

Still, he found Paige’s clear aversion to it interesting.

“I don’t mean in that way,” he said.

Her blue eyes widened further. “What way?” As if she had to prove her thoughts hadn’t even gotten near the bedroom door. She was a very cute, unconvincing liar.

“I don’t intend to sleep with you.” Even as he said it, he wondered if the underwear she had on beneath her clothes was a bright as the rest of her. Bright pink, showing hints of pale skin beneath delicate lace? He could imagine laying her down on white sheets, the filmy garments electric against the pristine backdrop.

Color flooded her cheeks and she looked down at the top of Ana’s head. “I … of course not. I mean … I never thought you did.”

He shouldn’t. He shouldn’t be toying with fantasies of it, either. He had to stay focused. He tightened down on the vein that seemed to bleed a never-ending flow of erotic, Paige-themed imagery through his brain.

“The look on your face said otherwise.”

“It was just an honest question. And anyway, you’re taking this a step deeper, and I’m entitled to ask some questions, and I just need to know what ‘real’ would mean to you. Other than the license, I guess.”

“What I mean by it being real, has to do with our activities outside the bedroom. You will need to accompany me to any events I might need to attend. We will have to get married, and you will have to move into my home. It has to look real.”

Dante didn’t like the idea of it. Not in the least. Of bringing this little rainbow whirlwind into his personal space. And not just Paige, but the baby, as well.

He gritted his teeth. His house was big. It would be fine. And it would be temporary. He didn’t question the decisions he made. He simply made them.

She nodded slowly. “I know. But I mean … it seems crazy and extreme.”

“It’s hardly extreme. Understand this, Paige, you’ve gotten us both into a bit of a dangerous game. There could be very real consequences if we’re caught in the lie. Very real for you, especially.”

She looked away, pulling her lush bottom lip between her teeth. “You’re right.”

He pulled his focus away from her mouth. “Of course I am. Do you have anything to drink?”

“Uh … there’s a box of wine in the fridge.”

Dante didn’t bother to keep the disapproval from showing on his face. “A box?”

“Yeah,” she said. “Sorry if that doesn’t meet with your standards. Maybe you can choose me some wine and a ring?”

“I’m not opposed to it. However, when you move into my home, there will be a wine selection waiting for you. And none of it will be boxed.”

“Well, la-dee-da,” she said, standing. “I’m going to put Ana in her crib. Do you think you can stand here for a minute and keep the internal judgment to a minimum?”

“I’ll do my best,” he said drily.

He watched her walk out of the room, his eyes drawn to the sway of her hips and the rounded curve of her butt. He was only human, and she was beautiful. Not his type in the least, and yet, it wasn’t the first time he’d noticed her.

He liked women who were cool. Contained. In both looks and manner. And Paige was none of those things, which made her both a fascination and impossible to ignore.

Paige returned a moment later, hands free, a wet spot on her shirt near her shoulder. “You have something on your shirt,” he said.

She looked down. “Oh. Yeah. She’s really drooly right now. No teeth to hold it back.”

He let out a long breath and sat down on the couch. “I think I will take some wine.”

The idea of having this woman and her explosion of belongings and a baby who was, by Paige’s description, drooly, in his home was enough to send a kick of anxiety through him.

Paige shrugged and headed to the kitchen, reaching up into a high cabinet and taking down two mismatched pieces of stemware. A green champagne flute and a clear wine goblet. Then she opened up the fridge and bent down, dispensing wine from the plastic tap that was jammed into the cardboard box, into the cups.

She kicked her shoes off and pushed them to the side as she walked to the couch, wineglasses in her hands. “I haven’t had anyone over in a long time. You know, other than the social worker.” She handed him the clear glass and moved to a chair that was positioned next to the couch. She sat down on her knees, her feet tucked up under her.

“In how long?”

Paige looked down into her wine. “Since Shyla died.”

“That must have been difficult.” It was hard for him to find the words you were supposed to say when people were grieving. Hard to know what they wanted to hear. He had experience dealing with death, and yet, he couldn’t remember what people had said to him. If they had said anything.

Paige took a sip of her wine and nodded. “Yes. She was my best friend. She and I moved to San Diego from Oregon together shortly after we graduated.”

“Why here?”

She shrugged. “It’s sunny? I don’t know. A chance to start over, I guess. Be new people. She met her boyfriend really soon after we got here, and she ended up moving in with him. Then she got pregnant and he freaked out. And I had her move in with me. It was crowded but great. And then … and then Ana was born and it was so fun to have her here. So amazing.” Paige looked down into her glass, tears sparkling on her lashes like shattered crystal. “We were making it work. The three of us.”

“How old are you, Paige?” he asked. She looked young. Beneath all the makeup, he was sure she looked like a girl who could still be in school. Her skin was smooth and pale, her blue eyes round, fringed with long, dark lashes. Her lips were full and pink, turned down at the corners, giving the illusion of a slight pout.

“Twenty-two.”

“You’re only twenty-two?” Ten years younger than he was. And yet she was willing to take on raising a child by herself. “Then why do you want to raise a child right now? You have so many years ahead of you. And don’t you want to get married?”

She shrugged. “Not really. And anyway, I guess … no this isn’t the ideal time for me to have a baby. And if you had asked me a few months ago if I was ready to have a baby, I would have told you no. But that would be a hypothetical baby. And Ana isn’t hypothetical. She’s here. And she doesn’t have anyone. Her birth mother is dead, my friend, my best friend is dead. The line on the birth certificate that should have a father’s name on it is blank. She needs me.”

“She needs anyone who will care for her. It doesn’t have to be you.” She flinched when he said the words.

“It does,” she said, her voice thin.

“Why?”

“I don’t know for sure if anyone else will love her like I do. And I … I knew Shyla. I knew her better than anyone, and she knew me. I’ll be able to tell her about her mother.” Paige’s throat convulsed. “And Shyla asked me to. She asked me to take care of her.”

That answer hit him hard in the chest and the memories he’d been pushing away from the moment they’d picked Ana up at the nursery crowded in, too fast and forceful for him to hold back anymore. He’d been much older than Ana when he’d lost his mother, so he remembered a lot on his own. Memories that he often wished he didn’t have. Of soft lullabies, gentle hands … and blood. In the end … so much blood.

He blinked and shook off the memory, reclaiming control, lifting the glass of wine to his lips and grimacing when the chilled, acrid liquid hit his tongue. There was no buzz on earth worth that. He set it back down on the table.

“I understand that.”

“It’s not just for her. It’s for me, too. I love her. Like … like she really is my baby. I saw her come into the world. I cared for her from the start, did the midnight feedings and visits to the doctor. I can’t … I can’t just let her go. Let her go to someone else. Someone who might not love her like I do. How could anyone love her like I do? I love her so much that sometimes it overwhelms me.”

Paige spoke with conviction, so much it vibrated from her petite frame. Dante couldn’t imagine emotion like that. It was so far beyond where he was now.

In truth, he couldn’t imagine a good emotion that strong. Fear, grief, the type that had the power to reduce a man to a quivering, raw mass of anguish … that he knew. But nothing like it since. Nothing that even came close. He was numb to feeling.

But he could sense hers, could feel them radiating off her. She didn’t hide them, didn’t sublimate them to try to deal with them. He doubted she could. She was too honest.

Well, except for that one little lie. The one he was currently enmeshed in.

“You cannot keep the pink in your hair,” he said. He needed to tone her down, to make her less distracting.

“What?” she sifted her fingers through her dark hair, the movement unconsciously sexy.

“I would hardly become engaged to a woman with pink hair.”

“Um … but you did. You totally just did.”

“I didn’t know about the pink stripe until recently. When I found out I nearly broke it off with you, so you promised to go to the hairdresser.”

“You can’t even see it if I have my hair down.”

“I saw it when we were in bed.” Again, the images of her skin against his sheets hit him hard.

Her cheeks colored a deep rose. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d made a woman blush, discounting Paige, and he certainly couldn’t remember ever finding it so fascinating.

“Uh … and that was your predominant thought? My pink hair? We did something wrong, in that case.” She looked away from him and took another long drink of her vile wine.

“Just color over it,” he said.

“I have an appointment in a few weeks. It’ll keep.”

“You seem to forget that I’m doing you a favor.”

“I didn’t think that was your predominant motivation. And anyway, I’m doing you a favor, too.”

He shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. I don’t know what the reaction will be. I’m curious to find out.”

“So, this is just a social experiment to you?”

“It’s interesting, yes. Ultimately though, it’s with a mind to improving business.”

“And deceiving people doesn’t bother you?”

“Does it bother you?”

She frowned. “Usually. But not now. Not for … not for Ana. I would do anything for her.”

“So I gathered.”

“I’m far more bothered by the fact that we’re actually … that we’ll be getting married.” She looked down, giving him a view of long, dark lashes spread over pale skin, and lids that were lined in emerald green, a sprinkling of golden glitter adding sparkle.

“If you can think of another way …”

She raised her focus, her expression open, honest. “I can’t. Nothing this certain.”

“Then don’t trouble yourself over it.”

She frowned. “I won’t. So, now what do we do?”

“I’ll text your ring size to Trevor and send him to procure something suitable. You will have it on your desk by lunch. Then … then we have a charity event to go to.”

“I don’t have anyone to watch Ana.”

“I’ll pay Genevieve to do it. She’s good with Ana, isn’t she?”

“Well, yes, but … I’ll have been away from her all day.”

“Leave early,” he said. “I’ll come here and pick you up before the event.”

“Why do you keep having answers to all of my problems?” she asked, her tone petulant.

“I would think that would be a good thing, especially since you have so many problems at the moment.”

She let out an exasperated sigh. “Granted.”

He stood, taking his glass of nearly untouched wine off the coffee table. “Good night, then. I’ll be by to pick you and Ana up at seven-thirty tomorrow morning.”

“Wait … pick me up?”

“You’re my woman now, Paige, and that comes with a certain set of expectations.”

She blinked. “I didn’t … I didn’t agree to this.”

“You brought me into this. That means you aren’t making all the rules anymore.” He turned and walked into the kitchen, pausing at the sink and dumping the contents of his glass down the drain. “That wine is unforgivable. I will teach you to like good wine.”

“And you’ll teach me to like good jewelry, and the sort of hair you deem ‘good.’ Tell me, Dante, what else will you teach me to like?” She crossed her arms beneath her breasts—rather generous breasts—and a rush of heat assailed him. Intense. Impossible to ignore.

The desire to lean in and trace her lips with his fingertip, with his tongue, was nearly too strong for him to overcome. But he would. He would keep control, as he always did.

He took one last, lingering look, at her pink lips. “That’s a very dangerous question, Paige,” he said. “Very dangerous.”

CHAPTER FOUR

THAT’S a very dangerous question.

Yes, it had been a dangerous question. Only Paige hadn’t realized just how dangerous until it had come out of her mouth. And she was certain that Dante didn’t realize how much truth was behind it. How much teaching she would need.

Oh, dear.

Just thinking about it again made her feel hot, all over. And that was exactly why she wasn’t going to think about her futile, one-sided attraction anymore

She looked at the clock and shifted in her chair. Genevieve was already here, and Ana had been happily passed off to her. It hadn’t taken the little girl more than a moment to recognize her daily caregiver and the two were happily playing on the rug in the living room.

Paige sighed and realized that she was jiggling her leg. She stopped herself. Her little nervous habit wasn’t a good look with the long, silky gown she was wearing.

Yes, she was wearing a dress, to go on a date. Which was something she hadn’t done in … almost ever. She wasn’t the girl that men went after. She was the screwup, the funny one. The one with a pink stripe in her hair, although Dante was putting the kibosh on that.

She didn’t get dressed up in slinky gowns to go to fancy charity dinners with billionaires. She also didn’t get engaged to billionaires. Oh, yeah, she didn’t really marry them, either, though that was now in her future. All because her stupid, impulsive brain had spit out the most ridiculous lie at the worst time.

Desperation wasn’t her best state. She more or less had a handle on the blurting these days. When she’d been a kid, all the way up into high school, it had been really bad. She was always saying stupid things and embarrassing herself, which was one reason she’d opted for class clown rather than trying to be sexy or cool or anything like that. Letting it go, instead of wishing she could be something she wasn’t, had been much easier.

Or rather, as the case had been, she’d had one incredibly defining, humiliating moment that never let her forget that there were certain guys, who liked certain kinds of girls. And she was not one of them.

There was a heavy knock at her door and she scrambled up out of the chair, grabbing her handbag and wrap. She scurried into the living room and bent down, dropping a kiss onto Ana’s soft, fuzzy head.

“I won’t be too late,” she said to Genevieve.

“I wouldn’t blame you if you were,” Genevieve said.

Paige’s cheeks got hot and she was sure they were a lovely shade of red. “I … we won’t be late.” She had to get a handle on the blushing, too. There was no reason to blush. Dante Romani was hardly going to ravish her in the back of his car.

She straightened and draped her bright purple wrap over her bare shoulders, giving herself a little look in the small mirror that hung in her living room on her way to the door of her apartment.

The door opened just as she reached it.

“Were you going to leave me freezing on the front step?”

“It’s San Diego. It’s not freezing. And you’re in the temperature-controlled hallway.”

“It’s the principle,” he said.

“I had to say goodbye to Ana. Do you want to see her?”

A strange look crossed his face. Confusion, fear, then boredom. “No.”

“Oh, sorry. Most people like babies, you know,” she said, stepping out into the hall, closing the door behind her.

“I have no interest in having any of my own. I’m not certain why it would be important for me to like babies.”

“They’re cute.”

“Yes, so are puppies but I don’t want one.”

“A baby isn’t a puppy,” she said.

He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter to me for the reason previously stated.”

She rolled her eyes and pushed the button on the elevator. “Right. Well. I hope Ana and I don’t disturb you too much when we live in your home, as you don’t want a wife or a child.”

“It’s a large house,” he said, his words carrying a stiff undertone, as if he didn’t believe it would be large enough.

The doors to the elevator slid open and they both stepped inside. She’d never noticed how small elevators really were before she’d taken to riding in them with Dante Romani. He made everything feel smaller. Tighter. Because he filled the space he was in so absolutely.

It wasn’t just because he was well over six feet tall and broad, either. It was his charisma, the dark energy that radiated from him. He was so unobtainable, so uninterested in what was happening around him. It made you want to go and grab his attention. Made you want to be in his sphere. To make him seem interested. To make him smile.

To make him laugh.

At least she did, but she was good at that. Making people laugh and smile. Defusing tension with antics and jokes. And she had, apparently, not learned her lesson about unobtainable men.

She nearly opened her mouth to make one when her eyes locked with his and the breath leached from her body.

His dark eyes roamed over her curves, taking in every inch of her. And she was reminded again of their exchange last night.

What else will you teach me to like?

Oh, no, no, no. She wasn’t going there. She never had before, no reason to start now.

Besides, Dante could have any woman he wanted, on the terms he chose. He had no reason to start lusting after her pink-striped self.

She’d grown up in a small town, and every guy she knew had known her from the time they were in kindergarten together. They knew that she talked too much, and that she very often laughed too loud. That she had trouble paying attention in class. That she’d cut a boy’s tongue with her braces during her first kiss. They knew that she’d been the focus of what had essentially been the senior prank. They knew that she’d barely passed high school, that her parents hadn’t seen the point of paying for her to go to college when she just wouldn’t apply herself. They’d watched her get a job at a coffee shop instead of going away to school like everyone else.

They had all watched her grow from an awkward kid, to an awkward teen, to an awkward adult. It was like living in a fishbowl. And being the slow fish with the crippled fin. Nothing like her straight-A achieving sister and her football-star brother.

She was just … Paige. And it had always seemed like a pitifully small accomplishment, just being her. For most of her life, she’d accepted it. She’d just put on the image they’d applied to her and owned it. So much easier than trying to be anything else.

But there was a point, as she was pouring a cup of coffee for her fiftieth customer of the day, who asked her about her brother or sister, and not about her, that she couldn’t do it anymore.

A week later she’d moved. Just so she could be new to a place. So she had a hope of finding who she was apart from the painful averageness that marked her life.

It hadn’t been an instant transformation, no sudden rise to the top of the social heap. But she’d made a small group of friends. She’d found her job at Colson’s. That provided her with the first real sense of pride she’d ever had in a job.

They’d seen her raw talent and they’d hired her based on that, not based on classroom performance. Colson’s, and by extension, Dante, was her first experience with being believed in.

Strange.

She cast him a sideways glance. He was tall and … rigid in his tux. Each line of his suit jacket conforming to his physique with precision. Dante was never ruffled. She envied that a little bit. Or a lot of a bit, truth be told. She was captivated by it, really, his control. His perfection. His beauty. It was a dark, masculine beauty, nothing soft or traditionally pretty about him. It made her want to look at him, and keep looking.

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