Beck stabs the salmon with his fork, pulling off a perfect flaky bite. He places it in his mouth, chewing and swallowing before speaking. “I know the boss.” He shrugs. “Something tells me he won’t care if you start the day with a wine headache.” He takes a big bite of the green beans. “Plus, that boss has a new assistant who will be grabbing him coffee to start the day. Nothing cures a wine headache like a cup of normal coffee.”
The way he emphasizes “normal” is clearly a jab at my coffee order. Rolling my eyes at him, I hold my fork in the air and point it at him. “Don’t knock my order until you try it.”
“I’ll be sticking with my usual.” He takes another bite of his food, almost halfway through his piece of salmon when I haven’t even taken my first bite.
I spear some salmon onto my fork, brushing the piece through the sauce he has on top before popping it into my mouth. A moan falls from my throat immediately, my eyes rolling back in my head with how delicious it is.
“I never imagined the first time I made you moan that I wouldn’t even be touching you.”
“This is delicious.” I shovel a large bite into my mouth, opening wide to fit salmon and green beans at the same time.
“My roasted chicken was delicious as well, but you didn’t seem to want anything to do with it last night.”
It takes a moment for me to finish chewing before I swallow. I wash the bite down with the wine, the sweetness of it pairing deliciously with the dish. Part of me wants to ask Beck how much the bottle of wine costs, but I decide against it. It’s probably better I don’t know. It’s too delicious and I don’t want to crush my dreams by knowing this glass of wine costs a pretty penny.
“One, I didn’t know you’d made food. And two, I just needed some space from you. You’ve only got yourself to blame for that.”
He raises his eyebrows, his wine glass perched in front of his lips. “Tell me why I should blame myself for you not getting to enjoy my roasted chicken?”
“Because you’re the one who has been all over the place. You come to my office all business as you offer to hire me as an assistant and then ask me to be your fake fiancée.”
“I distinctly remember how red you turned when we decided you’d never mutter Carter’s name again,” he interrupts.
That same blush creeps up my cheeks as I remember how abrupt his words had been in the conference room. “Okay well maybe not all business. But then last night, right there”—I point to the refrigerator—“it felt like you wanted to kiss me. But then you made me feel…” I sigh, not knowing what word to use. “I don’t know, silly, I guess? When you told me I was in the way I just felt silly. It made me feel like I’d misread the situation or something. So yeah, I didn’t want your roast chicken.”
“You didn’t misread the situation. I stopped because I’d remembered how you’d been the one to tell me we couldn’t kiss.”
“What a gentleman,” I quip. “Did that same sentiment not last until today?”
His laugh is low and rumbly, sending shivers down my spine. “Oh, Margo, I’m no gentleman. I kissed you today because you basically begged me to. I only have so much restraint. You may have once told me that you didn’t want us to kiss, but you asked me in that dressing room. Who am I to say no?”
We both focus on clearing our plates. I’m quite shocked by how tasty the food is. When Beck had told me he cooked, I didn’t think it would be this good. Is there anything this man can’t do?
With my plate now clean, I wrap my fingers around the stem of my wine glass and take a large sip. I take a deep breath, knowing I need to bite the bullet and start a conversation I’ve been dreading all day.
She doesn’t have to say a word for me to know exactly what she wants to talk about. I’ve been expecting her to want to talk more about our conversation at the office. In fact, I’ve been eager to discuss the terrible terms she set for herself and this agreement.
I’ve always been someone who gets what they want. And what I want is Margo Moretti.
One taste of her was not enough. My appetite for her only grows stronger, nowhere near satiated by the brief encounter in the dressing room. There’s so much more I want to do with her—to her—and it all begins with her accepting the mutual attraction between us.
“Say whatever you’d like to say, Margo,” I clip. My hands cross in my lap as I wait for her to yet again piss me off and downplay the chemistry between us.
Margo shifts in her chair, crossing and uncrossing her legs nervously. She’d be terrible in the boardroom by the way every emotion can be seen on her face. Her eyes look to the city skyline behind me, like it can give her some magical answer.
“I’m going to be honest here, I hadn’t expected things between us to get so heated. Especially so fast. For there to be so much…tension.”
My finger runs up and down the stem of my wine glass as I process her words. Quirking my head, I process every emotion on her face. “You didn’t?” My tone comes off a bit incredulous as I remember that night at the beach. There’s no way she didn’t expect tension.
The slight narrow of her eyes at me tells me her mind is replaying the same exact memory as mine. She lets out an aggravated sigh. “No, I didn’t, Beck. You’re you and I’m me. Yes, I was going to be your assistant and yes we were going to pretend to be engaged, but I’d expected it to end there.”
“No one’s to blame for that but you. I thought I’d made my attraction to you pretty clear when I laid out my offer.”
She gulps down half of her glass of wine, and I’d given her a pretty generous pour. “You’re literally known to be this womanizing playboy billionaire, I thought that was just how you talk to women in general.”
“I find that often with the women you’re referring to that there isn’t much need for conversation.”
A small amount of white wine falls from her lips, landing on her thin tank top and creating a small wet stain. “Do you always just say what comes to your mind?” She wipes at the dribble of wine still left on her chin.
I shrug before taking a sip of my own. “Occasionally. Typically, the things running through my head are much worse.”
“I don’t even want to know.”
“Going back to your earlier statement, yes, I’ve never been one to beat around the bush with women. I haven’t had to. I came to you with an offer that benefited the both of us. It’s an added bonus that there’s clearly mutual attraction between us. I don’t see the point in fighting or denying it.”
“Easy for you to say. You’re known for being cold and calculating, some people also speculate if you even have a heart.”
“Have you been reading articles about me, Margo?”
Her eyes roll. “It's just an observation. People think you don’t form attachments outside of your company.”
“Well people don’t really know me. I prefer to keep it that way. I can form attachments just fine, I’m just picky about doing it. I don’t particularly see anything wrong with that. Shouldn’t we all be that way?”