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“I’m not bluffing,” she bluffed. “I just hadn’t realized how quickly the stakes were rising. I’m prepared to pay that. Do we have a deal?” She offered her free hand.
“Oh, hell no. I don’t need the money and it’s clearly appreciating daily.” The value of its leverage with her was priceless.
He sipped his bourbon and her arm fell to her side.
“You’re quite desperate for this thing, aren’t you? Why?” The earring was pretty, Kaine supposed, but he didn’t see what all the fuss was about. “To sell it to Rohan yourself at a profit?”
“No.” She acted offended.
“I told you. I want to give it to my grandmother.”
“One earring.”
“It’s very special to her.”
Kaine had never understood attaching emotion to anything, least of all musty old objects. He didn’t even possess a favorite pair of jeans let alone a watch or a boat that he would grieve over sinking. Everything could be replaced, provided he kept his bank balance healthy enough to make the purchase.
As someone gambling in the tech industry, he didn’t even let the fluctuations in his cash flow bother him too greatly.
The only time he grew hot under the collar was when someone tried to take something from him. And someone had. A few weeks ago, her cousin Benny had blown a crater into Kaine’s net worth. The circle of investors whom Benny had assembled were all standing around the edge, throwing rocks to ensure he sank as quickly as possible.
That was a memory to hang on to, not the one where he had clasped that pointed chin and ravaged those pillowy lips with a hunger that sat in the pit of his gut right now, howling like a starving beast scenting more.
“I can’t be swayed by emotion,” he informed her, trying to burn away his ferocious thirst for her by finishing his neat bourbon in one fiery swallow. He cut his gaze down her front with dismissal, determined she wouldn’t know how thoroughly she was getting to him. “Not even by lust.”
Gisella had dressed to get past security without a lot of questions. There were always a few mistresses and trophy wives at events like this. All she’d had to say was, “I’m meeting my husband,” and she had sailed on in.
Now, however, as Kaine Michaels skimmed an appraising gaze over her while cynicism dug a curl into the corner of his mouth, she grew hot and wished she’d chosen a power suit.
At the same time, her brain picked apart his remark. Was he saying he felt lust toward her? That ought to offend her, not cause a seesaw of excitement and yearning. A flood of heat that was more pleasure than outrage began licking low in her belly.
She couldn’t help being deeply attracted to him, though. He’d been a force in a shirt with an open throat and suede jacket. Tonight, he wore a tuxedo with satin lapels over a shirt with hidden buttons. He ought to look like every other man in here, but from the cut of the shoulders to the break in his pant cuff over shiny, handcrafted Italian shoes, he was a man above the rest. One who knew it, too.
Trying to hide how deeply he mesmerized her, she said, “If I was here to seduce you, you would know it.”
The white of his teeth flashed. It wasn’t so much a smile of amusement as satisfaction. “I like a sense of humor, especially in my enemies. It keeps me from growing bored.”
“How am I your enemy? You’re angry with Benny.” If she left with nothing else tonight, she would understand why he was taking out his anger on her. “Tell me what you think he did.”
“I know what he did,” he said, turning so cold it was as if a door had been thrown open to the Arctic. A subzero blizzard swirled around her with his words. “He falsified mining samples and disappeared, framing me to look like the culprit. I’ve made explanations to my investors, but they aren’t buying it.”
“Wait, what?” She found her hand on his arm of its own accord, needing to steady herself.
He was like iron under the fabric of his jacket sleeve. He looked at her hand with a raised brow, making her lift it away self-consciously. Her pulse continued to bounce like a pinball.
She fought to recover and find her voice. Benny was a geologist. His exploration company operated as an arm of Barsi on Fifth. It allowed Barsi on Fifth, her employer, to offer its richest clientele a means of investing in gems and precious metals literally at ground level.
“Benny would never salt samples. Our entire family relies on the Barsi reputation remaining impeccable. We all do our part to keep it that way.”
“Yes, it would seem all of New York believes your family is beyond reproach. That’s why the investment consortium is blaming me for the fraud, turning my name to mud all the way down the Eastern Seaboard.”
She shook her head, wanting to sit down, but the room was nothing but high-top tables, glittering ice sculptures and gaggles of hoodies. The music and noise were getting to her and she noticed that people were watching them. It made her uncomfortable, now that Kaine had completely thrown her out of her element. She had to fight letting the cracks in her composure show.
“What exactly has Benny said?”
“Nothing. That’s why I had to get his attention. You’ve disappointed me, Gisella. I don’t think you want that earring nearly as badly as you pretend. I think you’re more interested in keeping Benny’s crime from coming to light. You’re trying to placate me. But this sort of mollification—” he circled his finger to encompass her painted lips to her painted toes “—is very last century. And entirely too predictable.”
His accusation sent a few more fractures zigzagging across her veneer of confidence. She had wanted to kiss him, not that she would admit it now. Not when he was so disparaging about something that had caused such a flagrant reaction in her it still put a scorch of vulnerability in her throat.
