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Maybe not a cab. Definitely not a cab. He’d drive her home himself.
Da, that was sorted. He waited for some of the tension he was holding in his shoulders to trickle away. It remained stubbornly where it was.
Unaccustomed to scruples when it came to hooking up with women looking to profit by their association, he applied his mind to something that wasn’t soft and warm and playing footsie with his conscience—tomorrow’s schedule. At 5:00 a.m. he had a conference call from south-east Asia that would take him through to seven. Then a breakfast dialogue with Canadian NHL representatives. Then he had to deal with the legal issues surrounding the Sazanov brothers being arrested for drug possession—huge red tape there. He had a lunch with investors from the Arab Emirates, who were flying up from Washington for the privilege, and a meet-and-greet with local mayoral officials, and then the Wolves’ last practice match before they took on Canada’s finest on Friday night.
But right now, strapped into his borrowed baby, the very nice Ferrari, was his reward for taking a little trouble tonight and dealing with one of the finer points of the tour personally.
He’d wine and dine her, and plunder her incredible treasure chest, and give her what she wanted in the morning: a little access to the players.
Da, baby, he thought as she peeked one of those curious glances at him, play your cards right and I’m all your Prince Charmings come at once.
* * *
Rose had never ridden in a sports car. They were certainly different. She felt as if she was very close to the road but at the same time gliding at speed over water because the ride was so smooth. Plato was doing that guy thing of making everything he did with the gears look effortless, but he was clearly doing it to impress her.
She could have told him just turning up had impressed her. She wasn’t going to forget having six feet six inches of gorgeous Russian male in her kitchen in a hurry.
She hadn’t liked his pushing his way into her house, or refusing to let her go and change out of her underthings, or the way he’d made all sorts of lewd accusations about her motives. Although, actually, that had given her a bit of a thrill. She thought she’d left confident, take-charge men behind in Texas. Apparently they bred them in Russia too.
She’d missed it, and she’d missed this part of herself. It had been a long time since a man had challenged her. After her four years in Houston she was super-sensitive to any man trying to get his way with her, but she just didn’t get that vibe from Plato. He was so incredibly confident she got the impression he assumed the world would bend his way—and it probably did.
Besides, it was past time to trust her instincts, and she told herself she could turn tail at any time. Not that this was going anywhere. A guy who looked like this, with money and power and prestige, didn’t date girls like her. He handed them his coat or a tip.
He didn’t wrap them up in their coat, keep an arm around them as he escorted them outside, and put them in a luxury car as if they belonged there, his big body radiating heat and security and protection.
Rose repressed a little sigh. She wouldn’t be confusing tonight’s little fantasy with anything more meaningful. Plato Kuragin was hardly going to hole up in Toronto and date her! Besides, she was here for the business. She had some funds to raise and this guy was big in funds. She could take a little jump into the unknown, enjoy herself for a while, but the bigger picture was the business.
Good to get that straight.
Twenty minutes later, as he seated her at their table, she was still thinking business even as her inner princess did a pirouette. The restaurant was on the seventy-fifth floor of a famous building. Rose had read about it in a glossy magazine recently. She just hadn’t expected she’d ever be dining here.
‘You could have just asked, you know,’ she said with a little smile.
‘Asked?’ Plato took his seat opposite her and leaned in closer, his focus intent on her face as if she fascinated him.
‘To have dinner with me.’
‘Is that what this is about?’ he asked.
‘What else could it be?’
He was silent for a moment. ‘I apologise for making assumptions,’ he said, in that deep, dark voice.
‘I hadn’t realised you’d made any.’ But they both knew he had. ‘Oh, you mean the groupie comment? Sorry to disappoint you. I’m about as interested in sport as you are in lipstick.’
‘I don’t know about that,’ he replied, his voice pitched low and intimate.
He eased forward, bringing his forearms down on the table, and suddenly it felt awfully small and insubstantial between them—although if she looked around the restaurant their table was no smaller than anyone else’s.
‘I could develop a fascination for the subject.’
It was a clichéd line and they both knew it. Plato didn’t back off, though. If anything the space between them seemed to get smaller and smaller, until all she could see was the suggestion of what his firm mouth could do to her lipstick and the gleam of purpose behind those rain-dark eyes.
Rose knew it was her birthright as a Southern woman to flirt, but this man was outside her experience—and she also wasn’t sure if overt flirting was going to get her what she wanted. Although at this point she wasn’t entirely certain what that was.
Plato leaned back and gave the maître d’ instructions about their meals, but his eyes never left hers. Rose was glad of the low lights in the restaurant, the candles between them, the shadows that hopefully went some way to disguising how susceptible she was to him.
‘You wanted to hear about my business?’
