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Obviously, I’d gotten too cocky.
Zach’s eyes didn’t budge from the board. “You’re about to lose.”
“Keep telling yourself that.”
I stood, stretching my arms and feigning a yawn. He rose to his feet, too, that scowl still wilting his lips.
I snapped the stone bowl shut. “Well, thank you for th?—”
“When will we finish the game?”
He removed his phone from his pocket and thumbed through it. His calendar app flashed before me. Goodness, it didn’t even occur to him that I’d say no.
His thumb shot up with each scroll, probably sorting through dates convenient forhim. “Tomorrow is no good for me, and I have a meeting in London the next day, though I will not be staying overnight.”
My jaw clamped shut with an audible snap.
It shouldn’t have surprised me. Zach wanted to be challenged. No, heneededto be challenged. Everyone around him bored him.
Unfortunately for him, I would rather drive home blindfolded and handcuffed than spend another second in his presence.
I scratched my cheek. “I, uh, have a busy schedule.”
“More parties to crash?”
I smoothed a hand over my dress, my palm sweaty. “That’s rude.”
“But not wrong. Who are you?”
His eyes were like two barrels of a gun, digging into the soft flesh of my temple, threatening to pull the trigger.
Death lurked behind those eyes. I wondered what they’d witnessed to suck the soul out of them.
“I’m a guest.”
“I’d remember if I invited you.”
“I’m someone’s plus one.”
“Name that someone.”
Would it kill him to budge?
I conjured the name of a man I guessed would be here. “Pierre Toureau.”
A client of mine. A very wealthy one. He owned restaurants, malls, and a fleet of Mid-Atlantic conservatories.
I bet Zach had invited him and his pretty grad student daughter Anamika.
A vein bulged in his neck. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Interesting. Does his wife know?”
Shit.
“I’m his niece.”
